Urban and rural house price gap widening, surveys show

The house price gap between Dublin and the rest of the country has widened again as property listing websites Daft and MyHome.ie have published their asking price reports for the first quarter of 2013. The reports suggest two divergent markets are emerging: Dublin and the rest of the country.

Both reports suggest demand in urban areas will compound the supply differences between Dublin and rural counties, as people want to live near cities where jobs are concentrated.

For the first time since 2007, house prices increased in a 12-month period, according to the Daft.ie report, up 0.3 per cent nationally and 0.5 per cent in Dublin. In the first quarter of 2013, prices were up 0.3 per cent nationally and up 1.8 per cent in Dublin.

However, MyHome.ie found asking prices nationally continued to fall in the first quarter of 2013 by 1.8 per cent.

On an annual basis MyHome.ie found that prices nationally fell by 9.8 per cent for the 12 months to the end of March, while Daft.ie claims a fall of 6.6 per cent nationally over the same period.

The average asking price across the State was € 171,000 on Daft.ie and €197,000 on Myhome.ie. Daft.ie found asking prices in Dublin in the first quarter of 2013 were up 0.5 per cent on a year previously, the first time since early 2007 that asking prices increased in a 12-month period.

MyHome.ie, which is owned by The Irish Times , found for the first time since 2006, Dublin prices have remained unchanged for the second quarter in a row. The annual rate of decline in Dublin was 4.8 per cent in the first quarter of 2012, down from 12 per cent in Q4 2012.

Myhome.ie said the rate of decline in property prices nationally has continued to moderate with prices falling by 1.8 per cent in the first quarter of 2013.