Just half of Dundalk's affordable houses taken up in scheme

Just five out of the ten houses in Louth County Council's affordable housing scheme are to be taken up, with the remaining five to revert to the developer to be sold on the open market, councillors learned at the Dundalk Municipal District April meeting.

Cllr Kevin Meenan raised the matter at the April meeting, seeking an update on the scheme. Senior Executive Officer, Mr John Lawrence told the meeting that the scheme has now closed with five applicants to the scheme "over the line".

Mr Lawrence had previously told members at the March meeting that Louth County Council, at that point, had received around 26 applications but added that the actual number of eligible applications was quite low, at that point, less than five. He had highlighted at the March meeting that there was “very strict criteria” in relation to applying for the scheme, adding that they had extended the closing date for applications to Wednesday 6 March.

Cllr Marianne Butler asked if Louth County Council could purchase the houses and use them for social housing, as it had done following the financial crash a number of years ago, but Mr Lawrence said that they would not be doing so.

He said that when the Council acquired properties to sell as affordable houses, the person buying the house didn't expect that their next door neighbour would be a social housing tenant, as they are private houses.

Mr Lawrence said that the Council was operating this way to recognise that they are private houses and if someone engaged with the local authority to buy a private house, it would look to minimise the number of social housing tenants in the immediate vicinity.

He added that this did not mean that the Council would not be availing of Part V, which provides for social and affordable houses, but said that with this particular scheme, people were buying the affordable houses on the basis that they were buying into a private development.

Cllr Edel Corrigan commented that private housing was used for social housing through HAP so she did not understand the reason why using these private houses would be an issue.

Mr Lawrence said that Part V means that 10% must be social housing, which people are aware of. With an affordable housing scheme, the intention is to sell private houses at a discounted rate, with the State taking an equity to help those who are unable, due to income barriers to afford the full cost of the houses.

He said that the Council's engagement with developers at the moment is on the basis that, they would not buy houses that have been earmarked for affordable houses but were not taken up, "certainly not on the basis of 50:50". He further added that they would not get the discount that would have gone to those buying them as affordable houses anyway, and that they did not want to buy the houses for €380k, the price at which they went on sale on the open market.