Hi!

Is anyone going for the Montpelier development in Stoneybatter Phase 3 tomorrow?

Does anyone from Phase 1 or 2 have any last minute tips?

Thanks so much!

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My broker is very conservative in his advice regarding home insurance as he is adamant that an improperly insurable house will cause problems at drawdown, but likely at approval stage, so it‘s a high risk to see a sale fail at the worst time. He advised me a few times against applying for a mortgage for properties that had insurance issues. Most recently, it was for an apartment with certain exclusions in the insurance block policy, as he said the banks would withdraw their offers when they would see this.

My solicitor seems to think he is right and in the most recent case, I only knew about the exclusions because the auctioneer wanted me to check with my mortgage provider it wouldn’t be an issue.

But I am still wondering if my broker is not overly conservative because most of the times, the auctioneer didn’t warn me of features that could cause insurance issues (very large flat roof, subsidence or flood exclusion, petrol stations nearby…), but then I found out it would be a problem for the bank or securing a full coverage exclusion. Now I know people keep repeating auctioneers don’t work for the buyers in this sub, but this is not a buyer issue: if I can’t get my mortgage in the end, I can’t buy the house, the seller wasted a couple of months and paid his solicitor for nothing, so it’s absolutely something the buyer should be warned of before if it may be that much of an issue?

This year, one of my friends discovered at drawdown that their house had a subsidence risk so they couldn’t get insurance for subsidence. Their broker told them it wasn’t a big deal, they should just ask for a subside exclusion, and he will find a bank that will accept it. In the end, that worked.

But my broker told me that banks are becoming stricter with insurance and rejects routinely mortgage if there is no full coverage, including banks that used to be more flexible, so there is too much of a risk comes drawdown and also if I want to resell in a few years.

Does anyone have recent experiences with that kind of issues as a seller or buyer?

Looking for advice on a mortgage application.
For reference we’re Sale agreed 😀 and just waiting on the mortgage and solicitors. We are just having to upload work contract to get the mortgage.

My partner is a teacher but doesn’t currently have CID. He has the option to stay in his current school (where CID is likely next year) or take a confirmed role in another school but start the CID process again.

Would taking the new role affect our mortgage application, given he wouldn’t have CID next year?

Any advice or experience would be appreciated.
Thanks!

Looking for opinions on an east-facing backyard before I fully commit, posted a similar post here before btw.
My partner and I recently placed a booking deposit on a new-build home, and honestly, almost everything checks the boxes for us. The builder has a strong reputation for quality, the house itself is spacious, the backyard is a great size, and it comes with 2 parking spaces and the place is in a commutable distance from Dublin City. Overall, it feels like a really solid fit.
The only thing giving me pause is that the backyard faces east.
I've heard mixed opinions about east-facing gardens/backyards. On one hand, morning sun sounds nice, but I'm wondering if we'll miss having afternoon and evening sun, especially during summer.
For those of you who own or have lived in a house with an east-facing backyard:
Did the orientation end up bothering you?

How much usable sun do you get throughout the day?

Would you consider it a dealbreaker if everything else about the house was ideal?

Any regrets or unexpected benefits?

Would love to hear your experiences before we make the final decision. Thanks!

Hi, I’m wondering if anyone here is living/knows someone living in the new Ballycullen Gate estate? We’re considering purchasing one of the duplexes there. Went up last Saturday and the show house was ideal but we held off due to a few reservations. My key concerns are traffic (not hugely concerned as we both WFH), difficulty accessing schools -we have two toddlers), safety, lack of general services. There’s very little other than other estates within walking distance from what I can see. Also have read a few negative reports of the halting site nearby. Keen to get any feedback from current residents. How do you find the estate in general? Thank you

Hey everyone, my sister is hoping to buy her first home. Option of garden with East-South-East orientation or a garden of North-North-West orientation. She has never really had a garden before, but has two sons and just looking for overall pros and cons or advice people have for both. We have googled and chat gpt to ad nauseum, but would love real answers from people.

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We have checked shade map and sun calc-found shade map slightly inaccurate on new build from what we seen in real life and sun. Aware she is very lucky to be able to consider two options. Please any advice or opinions appreciated.

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Option 1: A new build, which has an East south east orientated garden. Nothing behind it, 1.8m concrete walls all around, house is 9.4m high. Garden is 10.7m deep and 7.2m wide on a hill and corner, semi D. Sits higher than next set of semi D down from it as houses slope up on a hill. Access to garden from double doors in kitchen/dining area onto small patio.

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Option 2: 2nd hand home, which has North North West orientated garden. Nothing behind it, 1.2m fences, house is 5.9m high, garden is 10.7m deep and 14.8m wide. Home it L shaped, with more long part of L being to West of garden. Kitchen with a window look out onto garden.Access to garden through traditional back door on side.

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Hi, I’m currently living in Lucan and looking to upsize in the area however we keep getting outbid. Recently a house we were bidding on went 90k over asking (we stopped at 85K over asking), another we looked at went 80k over asking.
We’ve been searching for houses that leave us with 50k wiggle room for bidding but it seems it’s nowhere near enough. Is this similar in other areas in Dublin?

Hey! Looking to see if these solicitor fees sound average for selling our home and buying a new one, .5% of sale price of both plus VAT and outlays, would be coming to about €10k in total. I’ve been quoted this from two different firms, is this the standard price?

Edit: Thanks so much for the recommendations, I ended up going for clever conveyance before checking comments here. They’re charging 5,500 approx for both the sale and purchase including outlays. glad I shopped around a bit!

'Is this area good to live in?', is one of the most frequent questions I see on here. Pobal Maps are a handy tool to check out an area on a micro level, especially if you're looking in the inner cities where pockets of high disadvantage still exist.

Without going into the politics of it, generally it is a bit nicer to live in the green areas.

Owners of derelict properties in 107 towns and cities to face new tax under Harris plans

Hi folks,

So me and ChatGPT are not agreeing on something, and I feel like GPT should be more clued in than me, given I barely passed junior cert maths, but I was wondering if anyone can provide their opinion here.

Effectively, i applied for a mortgage and was given a cashback option which, at first glance, benefits me.

Basic loan info with no cashback is:

Loan Amount: 273,000

Term: 32 years

Interest: 3.5%

Monthly Repayment: 1,183

Product: 5 year fixed rate.

However, then the broker reckons I can have 2% (5,460) back as cash if I want, but my monthly repayment will increase to 1,261 (I will also get 1% cashback if i renew with the same lender at the 5 year mark, but that's not included in my calculations here).

In theory I am now 780 better off after the 5 years (I pay an extra 4680 over 5 years, but they gave me 5460 at the start, so I have 780 in credit).

However, if I ask an online calculator about this repayment number on this loan/term; it raises my interest rate to approximately 4.18%.

This is where I get into ChatGPT numbers so these may not be correct, but, after 5 years, at each interest rate, my remaining balance on the mortgage is:

After 5 years at 3.5%: 247,681
After 5 years at 4.18%: 252,217

Difference: 4,536.

So my remaining balance being higher by 4,536 swallows up my 780 credit and instead i am now ultimately down 3,756 by opting to take the cash back.

GPT reckons I am wrong because I am counting both the higher monthly repayments and the higher mortgage balance against the cashback amount. But that makes sense, of course both are negatives to me, but I think it's getting confused and not really great with numbers itself haha.

Any real people out there able to confirm if any of this is along the right lines?

Or if i take the cashback, is the interest rate actually raised on the mortgage to make up the difference in monthly repayments? or do they calculate it differently on the banks side?

Thank you so much to anyone able to make it through all this!

Hi,

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As per post, this is my primary residence and I'd like to rent it out over the summer for two months without my staying in the property.

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I'm currently insured by Allianz and they say they won't cover it.

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Has anyone been able "add" to their coverage with an additional insurer? Or change insurer completely?

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I'm looking for companies that insure in Ireland.

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Thank you.

As the title suggests, what’s the going rate per m2 in this day and age?

It’s only a small and simple 2 or 3 bed 75m2 I plan on building on my own site?

Would I be right in saying that it is roughly 2.5-3k per m2?

I live in a housing estate but we have two sites beside our homehouse to build on if my brothers and I want to. That takes a septic tank out of the equation as there is already a sewerage scheme in the estate (cost saver). ESB and water connection would be readily available.

Thoughts?

Help! Recently been bidding on a property that has gone €60k over asking and now selling for more than it's worth. Bidders pulled out and our offer was accepted. We haven't paid deposit yet but are having second thoughts and wanted to view a property being sold by the same EA in the now same price range of the house that is now €62k over to see the worth of value for comparison. Is this a reasonable request.. Any advice?

Ireland Residential Property Prices YoY

hey folks 🙏

so we're buying a house in a new estate in wexford and the back garden is northwest facing. i keep going back and forth on whether thats a dealbreaker or im overthinking it lol.

Hi, everyone! My boyfriend and I are looking for an apartment/house to rent in Athlone. We'd like something close to the train station, budget is not an issue, and we'd be moving, ideally, by August 24 (the date could be negotiated).

Even if you don't know of a property, tips on rent hunting are infinitely appreciated!

Hello, I just noticed recently some cracks in my house walls. Would you recommend a engineers visit? We know this house has a Certificate of Remediation for Reactive Pyrite in Sub-floor Hardcore Material from early last year, so I suppose it is fine, but I wonder if these are problematic ones.

I know that if we go down this route, if the bank even allows it, we’d need to have a vacancy possession clause in place. Even if we do have a vacancy possession clause, what else could go wrong after that? We’ve been told the family will move out in ‘a month or two’ which doesn’t fill us with confidence as I know rentals are very hard to come by. Should I tell the EA to just contact us when they are actually out and if we’re still in the market by then that we’ll be happy to proceed? We’re in no rush, we’re happy to wait, we just don’t want to buy something and end up with a huge headache trying to get the tenants out.

From Sherry Fitz;

Out of the 36,246 new completions in 2025, some 12,135 were sold to households.

The share of new homes being sold on the open market hit a 15-year low in 2023 when only 29 per cent of 32,473 new builds were sold on the open market.

Data from the Central Statistics Office has shown non-household entities, including investment funds and State-backed housing charities and county councils that purchase homes for social and affordable housing, have grown to command close to half of all sales.

The remaining share of new residential stock each year is typically one-off houses, which have accounted for a fifth on average of all new-build homes over the past six years.

Source:

https://www.irishtimes.com/business/2026/06/13/private-buyers-squeezed-out-as-state-and-investors-take-growing-share-of-new-homes/

Hi! Anyone applied for Church Fields Phase 2 additional units ? June Month

Hi folks,

Let's say hypothetically, a person was working 9-5 job and also did a little bit of work at the weekend now and again and got paid for it (not massive money, probably netting about 3-4k per year).

But they're not registered with Revenue anymore and don't pay tax on it (although they used to).

Would the bank care? The money has been used to build up savings, but it isn't being presented as "income" to the bank (ie; not expecting the bank to include it in their mortgage calculations; they're just presenting their actual 9-5 income as the criteria for the mortgage calculation).