# Census 2022 - interesting housing stats



## ClubMan (23 Jun 2022)

Census 2022 at a glance: A rundown of Ireland's big count
					

The Central Statistics Office has released preliminary data about Ireland’s population and housing.




					www.thejournal.ie
				






> 2,124,590*:* the number of houses in Ireland.
> 
> 166,752: The number of vacant homes, 8% of all houses in the country.
> 
> Over 48,000 dwellings that were recorded as vacant in 2016 remained vacant in 2022.


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## Paul O Mahoney (24 Jun 2022)

ClubMan said:


> Census 2022 at a glance: A rundown of Ireland's big count
> 
> 
> The Central Statistics Office has released preliminary data about Ireland’s population and housing.
> ...


I would imagine that the 48000 would include a lot of houses from the crash. There are other statistics that put vacant properties which have electricity water as a minimum between 95000 and 120,000, again the details of these houses are scant.

But overall it's a significant number but as usual finding out why these properties are vacant is almost impossible.


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## Gordon Gekko (24 Jun 2022)

Forgive my ignorance, but is a holiday home “vacant” or a temporarily vacant house in Ireland where the owners spend a few months in Portugal?


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## Peanuts (24 Jun 2022)

Gordon Gekko said:


> Forgive my ignorance, but is a holiday home “vacant” or a temporarily vacant house in Ireland where the owners spend a few months in Portugal?


It certainly includes the latter i.e. houses that are temporarily vacant for whatever reason (incl. between rental, up for sale etc not sure if it includes holiday homes. Someone from the CSO on the radio yesterday was quite clear on that but I don't recall what he said about holiday homes.


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## Paul O Mahoney (24 Jun 2022)

Peanuts said:


> It certainly includes the latter i.e. houses that are temporarily vacant for whatever reason (incl. between rental, up for sale etc not sure if it includes holiday homes. Someone from the CSO on the radio yesterday was quite clear on that but I don't recall what he said about holiday homes.


They really didn't say in detail what was included,  or I didn't hear it.

LPT receipts were received from 1836000 properties in 2021, not everyone is liable for LPT and the above represent 98% , will check that, so its reasonable to say the figures are a bit " all over the place " .


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## Groucho (24 Jun 2022)

More clarity in the CSO's Press Release. 



> “The Preliminary Results show that the total housing stock on 03 April 2022 was 2,124,590, an increase of 6.0% on the 2016 figure.
> 
> There were 16,560 fewer vacant dwellings (-9.0%) in 2022 compared to 2016.
> 
> ...



I also note from the CSO's *graphic* that the highest %age of vacant homes is in Co. Leitrim at 16%.  (1 in 6).


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## T McGibney (24 Jun 2022)

Paul O Mahoney said:


> I would imagine that the 48000 would include a lot of houses from the crash.



Seamus Coffey has comprehensively rebutted this theory, in a twitter thread this morning. https://twitter.com/seamuscoffey/status/1540250805739159553?s=20&t=-gDuebrkuNrFzVbOVdYUhg 
Here's what he said:



> Will the findings from #Census2022 dispel the myth that vacant units offer a substantial solution to Ireland’s housing woes?
> The results show that there is very little long-term vacancy in areas with the highest demand. Here is share of housing stock vacant in 2016 and 2022.
> 
> Yes, on Census night Dublin had c.30k units that were vacant but this mainly reflects natural churn rather than long-term vacancy.
> ...





Paul O Mahoney said:


> but as usual finding out why these properties are vacant is almost impossible.


From the detailed analysis I have seen today and yesterday, this is simply untrue.


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## Gordon Gekko (24 Jun 2022)

But is this data “accurate data”, or a case of “garbage in, garbage out”?

I can think of lots of people who have holiday homes in Ireland and who spend time in Portugal or Spain, particularly earlier in the year when the Census was on.

Are those homes “vacant” or not?

Are the homes of elderly people in nursing homes “vacant” or not?

“Vacant homes” conjures up images of swathes of ghost estate properties.

Is the narrative actually nonsense?


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## Early Riser (24 Jun 2022)

From the CSO website:

_A dwelling is classed as vacant by census enumerators if it is unoccupied on Census night, is not used as a holiday home and is not usually inhabited by occupants who are temporarily absent at the time of census.

The Census definition of a vacant dwelling is a point in time indicator taken on Census night as to whether the property was inhabited or not on Sunday 03 April 2022.

Census vacancy should not be used as a measure of long term vacancy or compared directly with vacancy figures produced by other sources which may use different definitions or methodology.

The Census vacancy definition has been used over several censuses which enables comparisons over time._


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## Purple (24 Jun 2022)

T McGibney said:


> Seamus Coffey has comprehensively rebutted this theory, in a twitter thread this morning. https://twitter.com/seamuscoffey/status/1540250805739159553?s=20&t=-gDuebrkuNrFzVbOVdYUhg
> Here's what he said:
> 
> 
> ...


Yet RTE had Lorcan Sirr on  Moaning Ireland this morning ignoring and he didn't seem to know any of this, even though he's a lecturer and head of research for the Faculty of the Built Environment in TUD. It's almost as if he was ignoring the facts in order to further an ideological agenda. He might be a great guy but I've no respect for his opinions on housing and housing policy.


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## Towger (24 Jun 2022)

In other words if there is no answer to a knock and/or they can't get a completed form back the Census Enumerator ticks a Vacant Box


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## Early Riser (24 Jun 2022)

Towger said:


> In other words if there is no answer to a knock and/or they can't get a completed form back the Census Enumerator ticks a Vacant Box


 I believe they are meant to enquire why there is no answer - neighbours, etc. It is more than just a "vacant" box - they have to indicate why it is vacant, eg, resident in Nursing Home, recently deceased, etc. Whether this always happens exhaustively I have no idea.


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## T McGibney (24 Jun 2022)

Purple said:


> Yet RTE had Lorcan Sirr on  Moaning Ireland this morning ignoring and he didn't seem to know any of this, even though he's a lecturer and head of research for the Faculty of the Built Environment in TUD. It's almost as if he was ignoring the facts in order to further an ideological agenda. He might be a great guy but I've no respect for his opinions on housing and housing policy.


I gave up on him years ago. The state of what passes for expertise in Irish academia is often atrocious.


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## Purple (24 Jun 2022)

T McGibney said:


> I gave up on him years ago. The state of what passes for expertise in Irish academia is often atrocious.


RTE have a strong left wing bias so they'll look for contributors who share that bias. There are plenty of good academics who form opinions based on data rather than selecting data which supports their ideological bias. They just won't get a voice on the left wing, heavily unionised public sector broadcaster.


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## PebbleBeach2020 (24 Jun 2022)

Rory Aherne is another who is forever on the radio. They class him as a lecturer whereas viewers/listeners should also be informed that he ran for election as a People Before Profit candidate unsuccessfully.

He is another that I find selects data which supports his ideological bias and never gives a balanced perspective. We all know what the problem is, but the notion that the solution can come from one source and only one is shows peoples ignorance. Very few commenters or self-proclaimed "experts" give a two-sided perspective and leave their baggage at the door. And the few who do, as previously pointed out, don't get any air-time as a result.


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## T McGibney (24 Jun 2022)

PebbleBeach2020 said:


> he ran for election as a People Before Profit candidate uncsuccessfully.


If you mention that to him on Twitter, he may well block you.


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## Purple (24 Jun 2022)

PebbleBeach2020 said:


> ery few commentors or self-proclaimed "experts" give a two-sided perspective and leave their baggage at the door. And the few who do, as previously pointed out, don't get any air-time as a result.


Yep, it's rare enough that someone who is presented as a expert says that it's a complex problem mainly driven by external factors and there's no quick solutions. What is blindingly obvious is that the Government, any government, would do whatever it can to fix the problem as it is the number one issue for most voters... as long as they could do it without upsetting the usual moaning classes.

It is worth noting that these are problems of success; if we had a basket case of an economy and 50,000 people were leaving the country each year there'd be no housing problem. 

The fact is that is so many ways this is a great country in which to live so people who are from here want to stay here and people who aren't from here want to live here. One in every 6 people who live here is an immigrant. By comparison less than one in every 14 people  in Northern Ireland were born outside of Northern Ireland and less than one in 50 were born outside the UK or Ireland. We have plenty of problems but we do lots of things very well.


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## PGF2016 (24 Jun 2022)

PebbleBeach2020 said:


> Rory Aherne is another whois forever on the radio. They class him as a lecturer whereas viewers/listeners should also be informed that he ran for election as a People Before Profit candidate uncsuccessfully.
> 
> He is another that I find selects data which supports his ideological bias and never gives a balanced perspective. We all know what the problem is, but the notion that the solution can come from one source and only one is shows peoples ignorance. Very few commentors or self-proclaimed "experts" give a two-sided perspective and leave their baggage at the door. And the few who do, as previously pointed out, don't get any air-time as a result.


I'm not familiar with him. What's his solution?


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## Purple (24 Jun 2022)

PGF2016 said:


> I'm not familiar with him. What's his solution?


You can buy his book _Housing Shock : The Irish Housing Crisis and How to Solve It by Rory Hearne_
The blurb tells us that;


> The unprecedented housing and homelessness crisis in Ireland is having profound impacts on Generation Rent, the wellbeing of children, worsening wider inequality and threatening the economy. Hearne contextualises the Irish housing crisis within the broader global housing situation by examining the origins of the crisis in terms of austerity, marketisation and the new era of financialisation, where global investors are making housing unaffordable and turning it into an asset for the wealthy. He brings to the fore the perspectives of those most affected, new housing activists and protesters whilst providing innovative global solutions for a new vision for affordable, sustainable homes for all.



I hope he's not making a profit from people by selling his book because, like, shouldn't he be putting people before profit?

Anyway, the problem is capitalism and greed.

As a socialist I know that all rich people are greedy and evil.
Nobody is rich because they are smarter and harder working then me because I'm really smart, therefore they're just greedier and more dishonest than me. I'm more virtuous; I win. 

That's the sort of balanced commentary the people of Ireland are crying out for. Thank god the Brethren in RTE are giving it to them in spades.


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## elcato (24 Jun 2022)

Early Riser said:


> I believe they are meant to enquire why there is no answer - neighbours, etc. It is more than just a "vacant" box - they have to indicate why it is vacant, eg, resident in Nursing Home, recently deceased, etc. Whether this always happens exhaustively I have no idea.


I was one of these (apartment in da shmoke) and I was out of the country on that night. I did answer my door and she assured me that she does not need any more information except that I was not in the dwelling on said night.


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## Early Riser (24 Jun 2022)

elcato said:


> I was one of these (apartment in da shmoke) and I was out of the country on that night. I did answer my door and she assured me that she does not need any more information except that I was not in the dwelling on said night.


Mea Culpa.
It was an informal rather than formal part of the 2016 Census. Enumerators were asked to try to ascertain the reason for any vacancy and and to make a note of it. The results were very incomplete and publised as "supplementary analysis" - towards the lower end of this webpage: https://www.cso.ie/en/releasesandpublications/ep/p-cp1hii/cp1hii/vac/ .

I don't know what approach may have been taken this time, but analysis of this (if any) will be in the late stages. Next year maybe. 
I saw the enumerator call numerous times to houses around here and he did ask me about a neighbouring property.


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## Groucho (24 Jun 2022)

Purple said:


> You can buy his book _Housing Shock : The Irish Housing Crisis and How to Solve It by Rory Hearne_
> 
> I hope he's not making a profit from people by selling his book because, like, shouldn't he be putting people before profit?
> 
> ...



And it's not just RTE! - in addition to lecturing to impressionable young students in NUIM, Doctor Hearne has a (far too) regular column in The Journal.ie to promote his agenda.


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## ClubMan (24 Jun 2022)

elcato said:


> I was one of these (apartment in da shmoke) and I was out of the country on that night. I did answer my door and she assured me that she does not need any more information except that I was not in the dwelling on said night.


She was supposed to ask you where you'd be, link that to the entry for your dwelling, and mark you as "away" but not the property as vacant. Vacant properties are exactly that, not dwellings normally occupied but where the residents are away on census night.


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## Purple (24 Jun 2022)

Groucho said:


> And it's not just RTE! - in addition to lecturing to impressionable young students in NUIM, Doctor Hearne has a (far too) regular column in The Journal.ie to promote his agenda.


The Journal is like an even more Woke and sensational version of RTÉ, a Student newspaper that thinks it does proper journalism. 
They’re a long way from Woodward and Bernstein. Writers in RTÉ, the Irish Times and much of the media think they are journalists when in fact they are opinion writers. I understand why, journalism is expensive but hyperbole is cheap. When the banks were fined for the tracker scandal it struck me that there was more genuine research and light shone on the issue on this website than in most of the outlets filling column inches about it now. 
I’m sure RTÉ will do some after the fact expose about it soon.


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## Groucho (25 Jun 2022)

Purple said:


> I’m sure RTÉ will do some after the fact expose about it soon.



No doubt about that!   But the expose will be superficial and sensationalist and will target the lowest hanging fruit instead of asking the harder questions about why the regulators remained asleep at the wheel for so long.


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## Purple (27 Jun 2022)

Groucho said:


> No doubt about that!   But the expose will be superficial and sensationalist and will target the lowest hanging fruit instead of asking the harder questions about why the regulators remained asleep at the wheel for so long.


Exactly; it will be about greed and capitalism and developers and bankers but not about the systemic failure of State institutions and the personal failure of State employees who just didn't do their job.


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## NoRegretsCoyote (27 Jun 2022)

Groucho said:


> the lowest hanging fruit instead of asking the harder questions about why the regulators remained asleep at the wheel for so long.


Prime Time Investigates (or whatever it's called now) does some decent investigative journalism. But I'd say it is 2% of the budget of news and current affairs. 

In contrast RTÉ seem to have a dozen staff situated in or around Leinster House talking to politicians, with often the most superficial treatment possible.


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## Clueless Clive (28 Jun 2022)

NoRegretsCoyote said:


> Prime Time Investigates (or whatever it's called now) does some decent investigative journalism. But I'd say it is 2% of the budget of news and current affairs.
> 
> In contrast RTÉ seem to have a dozen staff situated in or around Leinster House talking to politicians, with often the most superficial treatment possible.


Considering the revolving door that is a career between being a political analyst for media and political advisors for politicians, it wouldn't be good for business to go too hard on them. See Aoife from Derry - only a matter of time before she finds a cause she believes in for more than a week when she'll hitch her wagon to the wokest politician going. Surprised it hasn't happened already.


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## lff12 (1 Jul 2022)

PGF2016 said:


> I'm not familiar with him. What's his solution?


Social housing builds on a massive scale on existing publicly owned land.


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## Purple (1 Jul 2022)

lff12 said:


> Social housing builds on a massive scale on existing publicly owned land.


Who is going to do the building?
At the moment labour is just as much of a constraint as land.


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## cremeegg (1 Jul 2022)

lff12 said:


> Social housing builds on a massive scale on existing publicly owned land.


That is not a bad plan. If the necessary legal framework was introduced to allow councils to be effective landlords.


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## Paul O Mahoney (1 Jul 2022)

cremeegg said:


> That is not a bad plan. If the necessary legal framework was introduced to allow councils to be effective landlords.


Councils already are landlords not a large as in history, there is no additionally legal requirements, but it's now outsourced to a plethora of 3rd party entities.


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## Paul O Mahoney (1 Jul 2022)

lff12 said:


> Social housing builds on a massive scale on existing publicly owned land.


No doubt when he arrives to work he must be furious with all the land NUIM sits on


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## Groucho (1 Jul 2022)

Clueless Clive said:


> Considering the revolving door that is a career between being a political analyst for media and political advisors for politicians, it wouldn't be good for business to go too hard on them. See Aoife from Derry - only a matter of time before she finds a cause she believes in for more than a week when she'll hitch her wagon to the wokest politician going. Surprised it hasn't happened already.



Well I find her latest breathless "scoop" - already flogged to death on RTE TV and radio news - somewhat underwhelming.


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