# Tiger-era housing defects (apartments mainly)



## wondering (4 Dec 2022)

Up to 100,000 defective Celtic Tiger-era homes may need remediation
					

Scheme to fix defects to be submitted to Cabinet in weeks following report of working group




					www.irishtimes.com
				




Fairly depressing if you're looking to move. Aside from the lack of places available, if you're lucky enough to find a place and it happened to be built 10-30 years ago, very high chance it'll be a cold, damp, non-soundproof kip.



> A working group on defects in housing, which reported last July, found a lack of fire safety material, structural defects and water ingress are likely to affect up to 80 per cent of apartments and duplexes built between 1991 and 2013, which equates to between 62,500 and 100,000 homes.



I would have thought tiger-era building meant late-90s to c.2008 but according to the article it's a much bigger timeframe.



> the majority of apartment developments haven’t had assessments carried out in them in relation to fire safety defects. It is likely that the majority of defects have not yet been uncovered.”


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## wondering (4 Dec 2022)

If you want to use your 2nd free article, this one is worth a read as well (July 2022)









						Report on defects in apartments forensically details extent of the malaise left by Celtic Tiger and its shoddy legacy
					

Those involved immiserated thousands of blameless homebuyers and now leave little more than a bill for billions of euro in their wake, writes Jack Horgan Jones




					www.irishtimes.com
				






> “The common thread [to defects] seems to be an overall lack of understanding of the complexities of constructing these buildings in accordance with the Building Regulations in place at the time, inadequate supervision and inspection..."
> 
> ..ineffective or absent fire stopping, inappropriate cladding, building layouts that didn’t match fire safety certs, movement in foundations, cracks in substructures, water ingress through walls — the list goes on.





> As a proportion of the total it is not massive, but it is a large majority of purpose-built apartments and many of these are in densely populated urban centres.


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## Purple (5 Dec 2022)

What should be a shocking failure by the Public Servants in the department of the Environment to do their job but is actually unsurprising.


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## NoRegretsCoyote (5 Dec 2022)

There are a lot of headlines in this space but they are rarely put into context.

There were approximately 900k dwellings built between 1991 and 2016, the largest and most sustained burst of building activity ever in Ireland. about 200k of these were apartments.

Yes there was Priory Hall which had to be demolished. But this was one of literally thousands of apartment schemes built in the period. 

Of course there were failures with respect to the standards that need to be remediated. But I am not aware of many fire-related deaths or serious injury in an apartment that can be tangibly linked to a failure in building standards. 

Any dwelling of any age may potentially need remediation. Buildings only remain standing because of constant repair.

For anyone buying any dwelling of any age _caveat emptor_ should always apply.


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## llgon (5 Dec 2022)

NoRegretsCoyote said:


> But I am not aware of many fire-related deaths or serious injury in an apartment that can be tangibly linked to a failure in building standards.


Grenfell tower?

Just because it didn't happen in Ireland doesn't mean that it couldn't.


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## NoRegretsCoyote (5 Dec 2022)

llgon said:


> Just because it didn't happen in Ireland doesn't mean that it couldn't.


Of course. 

But at this point you have close to half a million people living in Tiger-era apartments for decades. That's a long time for very little to happen to a lot of people.


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## joe sod (5 Dec 2022)

I think the fire regulations in Ireland are very onerous especially for older buildings.  In the UK and elsewhere they have common sense requirements for older buildings whereby the main fireguard measures are carried out but it doesn't have to comply to the same requirements as new builds. Grenfall is an exception because I think the wrong cladding was used ,in any case we don't have high rise apartment blocks and we demolished the ballymun towers  for other reasons anti social stuff mainly.

This means that older buildings in Ireland are left vacant and are falling down because complying with the fire regulations is too onerous and expensive,  it essentially means demolishing the building and rebuilding. Hugh Wallace the architect was talking about this issue the other day. Surely a new set of regulations that take into account the difficulties in carrying out works on existing and older buildings should be drafted especially now that we have this huge job and cost of all this retrofitting and all these vacant buildings falling down. Don't let perfection be the enemy of the good


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## Peanuts20 (5 Dec 2022)

I moved back from the UK in the early noughties. For the first few years, I rented and lived in 3 different Celtic Tigers appartments/townhouses. One was perfect, well built and insulated and soundproofed, one was freezing, no insulation at all it seemed in the building and one had serious dampness and water egress issues when the wind and rain was coming in the wrong direction. All were very expensive, Dublin South side appartments. I used to walk to work most days and pass many building sites, I remember watching the block work on one particular development and thinking that even to a relative layman like me, the blockwork was shockingly bad on it. But plaster covered a thousand woes.

As a result, and based on my own personal experience over 5 years, I wouldn't buy a Celtic era appartment for love nor money.


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## odyssey06 (5 Dec 2022)

joe sod said:


> I think the fire regulations in Ireland are very onerous especially for older buildings.  In the UK and elsewhere they have common sense requirements for older buildings whereby the main fireguard measures are carried out but it doesn't have to comply to the same requirements as new builds. Grenfall is an exception because I think the wrong cladding was used ,in any case we don't have high rise apartment blocks and we demolished the ballymun towers  for other reasons anti social stuff mainly.
> 
> This means that older buildings in Ireland are left vacant and are falling down because complying with the fire regulations is too onerous and expensive,  it essentially means demolishing the building and rebuilding. Hugh Wallace the architect was talking about this issue the other day. Surely a new set of regulations that take into account the difficulties in carrying out works on existing and older buildings should be drafted especially now that we have this huge job and cost of all this retrofitting and all these vacant buildings falling down. Don't let perfection be the enemy of the good


The regulations actually discourage improvements in older buildings, because if you try to make any improvement, you are on the hook for modern standards.


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## T McGibney (5 Dec 2022)

NoRegretsCoyote said:


> But I am not aware of many fire-related deaths or serious injury in an apartment that can be tangibly linked to a failure in building standards.





llgon said:


> Grenfell tower?


Wasn't the Grenfell tragedy caused (or at least worsened) by adherence to building standards, ie gratuitously casing the exterior in flammable crud mandated by standards?


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## lff12 (5 Dec 2022)

wondering said:


> Up to 100,000 defective Celtic Tiger-era homes may need remediation
> 
> 
> Scheme to fix defects to be submitted to Cabinet in weeks following report of working group
> ...


I think self certification went back to the 90s, and fire hazards certainly existed in 1990s built apartments. Have come across at least one case of where fire cert was missing for a mid 90s build and never remediated (how they have block insurance I don't know).


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## lff12 (5 Dec 2022)

T McGibney said:


> Wasn't the Grenfell tragedy caused (or at least worsened) by adherence to building standards, ie gratuitously casing the exterior in flammable crud mandated by standards?


Not really - it was a case of regulatory failure. Same product (Reynobond PE 55) had two different versions, a US version which was compliant for high rise use, and a UK version which wasn't. To top it off, the product itself had been lab tested & failed one of the tests, but the result was written off as a "rogue result" and dismissed. Manufacturer didn't reveal the results of their tests when applying for certification in 2006 (or that there were different versions with different test results) & UK-centric view of certification didn't acknowledge that there was a more fire retardant version destined only for EU markets (and using EU certification). Manufacturer basically fudged the UK certification system, and sold hundreds of thousands of square meters of defective panels into UK market.

There was pressure to insulate buildings more effectively, and this encouraged use of this product, often in the inappropriate high rise setting like Grenfell.









						How the products used in Grenfell Tower’s cladding system were tested and sold
					

Inside Housing, news, analysis, and comment about the social housing sector in the UK.




					www.insidehousing.co.uk


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## joe sod (5 Dec 2022)

I thought the cladding was used more for appearance rather than insulation.  They wanted to make them look bright and modern rather than grey concrete blocks


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## lff12 (5 Dec 2022)

joe sod said:


> I think the fire regulations in Ireland are very onerous especially for older buildings.  In the UK and elsewhere they have common sense requirements for older buildings whereby the main fireguard measures are carried out but it doesn't have to comply to the same requirements as new builds. Grenfall is an exception because I think the wrong cladding was used ,in any case we don't have high rise apartment blocks and we demolished the ballymun towers  for other reasons anti social stuff mainly.
> 
> This means that older buildings in Ireland are left vacant and are falling down because complying with the fire regulations is too onerous and expensive,  it essentially means demolishing the building and rebuilding. Hugh Wallace the architect was talking about this issue the other day. Surely a new set of regulations that take into account the difficulties in carrying out works on existing and older buildings should be drafted especially now that we have this huge job and cost of all this retrofitting and all these vacant buildings falling down. Don't let perfection be the enemy of the good


Sort of. In most cases they can be remediated but I think what you mean are listed buildings where you cannot change the outside appearance & the interior might have some protected features. These can be done, but its not obvious to owners. Most local authorities have specialist teams who engage with such property owners, but its not widely promoted and they certainly are not proactive except in pouncing on cases where unauthorised changes were made.


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## lff12 (5 Dec 2022)

NoRegretsCoyote said:


> There are a lot of headlines in this space but they are rarely put into context.
> 
> There were approximately 900k dwellings built between 1991 and 2016, the largest and most sustained burst of building activity ever in Ireland. about 200k of these were apartments.
> 
> ...


That's why the figures say _as many as_.
I somehow doubt the figure is 50% of apartments built, & the bulk were identified long ago. Part of the issue is that many are multi building developments with OMCs divided by building so some owners might be behind the curve in discovering issues. Somehow think the figure will be whittled down well beneath the sensational sounding 50% headline figure. Part of the issue is that there is no obligation to inform buyers that there are issues, so there is every incentive to "not find out" if you are planning on selling. According to Apartment Owners Network 70% of apartments are investments, so all the more reason to "not find out" if its a unit you are planning on selling.


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## lff12 (5 Dec 2022)

wondering said:


> Fairly depressing if you're looking to move. Aside from the lack of places available, if you're lucky enough to find a place and it happened to be built 10-30 years ago, very high chance it'll be a cold, damp, non-soundproof kip.


That's not what defects are about. In the majority of cases the report states the issue is lack of fire proofing to the standard expected, mostly in communal areas such as entrance halls and hallways between units. There are some cases of poor damp proofing, but by the far the majority of cases refer to fire proofing.
In the cases I know of typically the units are C2-B3 rated so an occupier is probably blissfully unaware until there is a fire. Even C2 with gas heating would be pretty toasty by overall standards.


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## lff12 (5 Dec 2022)

NoRegretsCoyote said:


> Of course.
> 
> But at this point you have close to half a million people living in Tiger-era apartments for decades. That's a long time for very little to happen to a lot of people.


Indeed, but its primarily a risk issue, with knock on impact on property values. The estates in my area with defects have very depressed values on the whole - even units highly unlikely to have fire stopping issues. Oddly enough, there was a large number of two storey terraces built in one of the estates, which to my knowledge are unimpacted, as the issue mainly related in that case to lack of firestopping in entrance halls and communal halls between apartments.


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## joe sod (5 Dec 2022)

lff12 said:


> Indeed, but its primarily a risk issue, with knock on impact on property values. The estates in my area with defects have very depressed values on the whole - even units highly unlikely to have fire stopping issues. Oddly enough, there was a large number of two storey terraces built in one of the estates, which to my knowledge are unimpacted, as the issue mainly related in that case to lack of firestopping in entrance halls and communal halls between apartments.


But surely if it is a risk issue we'll then the minimum requirements to reduce the risk should be carried out rather than trying to comply with every detail of the modern day standards. Usually the rudimentary changes to apply fire proofing would be enough to reduce the fire risk substantially .
Surely they should come up with a set of measures that's relatively straight forward to apply, for example could fire proofing not be pumped into wall cavities or just slabbed to the outside of a dividing wall. They need to think about the practicalities and consult with builders about what is the best strategy for accomplishing it.
After all the authorities are indirectly responsible for having the self regulation regime in the first place so they need to take some responsibility and be cognisant of the practicalities involved in remedying the situation now


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## lff12 (5 Dec 2022)

joe sod said:


> But surely if it is a risk issue we'll then the minimum requirements to reduce the risk should be carried out rather than trying to comply with every detail of the modern day standards. Usually the rudimentary changes to apply fire proofing would be enough to reduce the fire risk substantially .
> Surely they should come up with a set of measures that's relatively straight forward to apply, for example could fire proofing not be pumped into wall cavities or just slabbed to the outside of a dividing wall. They need to think about the practicalities and consult with builders about what is the best strategy for accomplishing it.
> After all the authorities are indirectly responsible for having the self regulation regime in the first place so they need to take some responsibility and be cognisant of the practicalities involved in remedying the situation now


Indeed, I hear you, but modern standards consist of a whole load of small details which contribute to the overall standard. Most of these defects are complex enough to not have simple solutions, but also require post remediation inspection which validate the work. Hence the expense - its not just a matter of quick stop solutions, but holistic ones that can be validated and closed with full evidence.
Read for more detail https://constructiondefectsalliance...legacy_issues_from_the_celtic_tiger_years.pdf


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## lff12 (5 Dec 2022)

Ah - this is the link I was looking for, and helpful for people questioning why the defect remediation process is both costly and difficult


			https://view.officeapps.live.com/op/view.aspx?src=https%3A%2F%2Fapartmentownersnetwork.org%2Fwp-content%2Fuploads%2F2022%2F02%2Fkhollingsworth-aon-presentation-18-07-20171.pptx&wdOrigin=BROWSELINK


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## Purple (5 Dec 2022)

Excellent and informative posts on this topic @lff12.


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## AlbacoreA (6 Dec 2022)

“The common thread [to defects] seems to be an overall lack of understanding of the complexities of constructing these buildings in accordance with the Building Regulations in place at the time, inadequate supervision and inspection..."

Let's be honest. They were deliberately thrown up as fast as possible with deliberately no regard to standards or quality often by builders and workers with sub par abilities. The local authorities completely absconded from their responsibilities around quality control and standards. Everyone turned a blind eye for the fast buck. 

Even if no safety problems occur the owners will be fixing the defects and shoddy workmanship for the lifespan of theses properties. Be they apartments or houses they will have fair higher running and maintenance costs than they should. That's before someone decides retrospectively to insist on applying QC and safety standards decades after they've been built.


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