THE NUMBER of homes built in Limerick in the last year and the number due to be built this year falls far short of the “acute and particular needs” in Limerick.
That’s according to Labour spokesperson on housing, Deputy Conor Sheehan, who was commenting on figures just released by the official GeoDirectory Residential Buildings Report.
According to the report from the address database, the residential vacancy rate was 3.8 per cent in Limerick in the last three months of 2024. This was equal to the national average.
A total of 805 new residential address points were added to the GeoDirectory database in Limerick in 2024 and 639 residential buildings were classified as under construction in Limerick in December 2024
The average house price in Limerick was €300,922 in the 12 months to November 2024.
Cllr Sheehan said that the numbers are “shocking but not surprising”, and “far short” of meeting the current and future housing needs across the county.
“The situation in Limerick is particularly acute. I say that because in the 12 months up to October last year, the price of an average house in Limerick rose by 13 per cent, as opposed to a national rise of 10 per cent,” he told the Limerick Post.
“Added to that, we have a much more concentrated demand for housing here. We need the state to take a much more pro-active approach”.
The Labour Deputy pointed to the sites under the remit of the Land Development Agency, saying that “there are six sites under the LDA in Limerick, yet all we have so far is a design team appointed to one of them”.
“We’re short 500 planners yet they are not even on the critical skills list so we could recruit from abroad.
“We need more local authority housing and to facilitate that we need a single stage approval process. Builders and developers, especially small and medium companies, need access to finance if they can’t get it from the pillar institutions. That could be facilitated through the Future Ireland fund.
“And we need An Bord Pleanála to be transparent and consistent. Right now, people are not getting planning decisions in a timely manner,” he said.
Deputy Sheehan said that Limerick housing needs “must be tackled more urgently. We are in an acute situation here.”
