As the Government parties survey the wreckage of their overconfident housing promises, they now find themselves scrambling to revive the most sluggish sector in the construction industry: apartment development. The dramatic fall in apartment completions was a major contributor to the overall housing shortfall last year, and the outlook for 2025 appears equally grim.
A variety of factors are at play, not all of them within the Government’s control. Shifting international investment dynamics, higher interest rates and weaker yields have changed the calculus for global funds that once financed large-scale, buy-to-let developments. Nonetheless, the Government is not without tools to influence the situation. Its recent actions suggest a growing willingness to use every one of them.
The Cabinet has already approved the loosening of rent pressure zone rules, allowing landlords in new-build blocks to charge higher rents, in the hope that this will entice investors back into the market. Senior Ministers, including the Taoiseach, have also signalled an openness to introducing targeted tax breaks for apartment developers.
Today, the Cabinet approved a set of changes to planning standards. These will make it easier to build smaller, more tightly packed and arguably less habitable apartment units. In effect, the standards for natural light, storage, and amenity space are being diluted. While the changes may please construction lobbyists – many of whom have long argued that strict planning rules have strangled supply – they raise important questions about the quality of future housing stock.
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It is worth noting that this is the third significant downgrade in design standards since 2015, following similar moves under former housing ministers Alan Kelly and Eoghan Murphy. Whether those relaxations delivered a measurable uptick in development is far from clear. If anything, the current slump suggests they did not.
Officials in James Browne’s Department of Housing argue that the revised standards still compare favourably to those in other European countries. That claim demands scrutiny. Many Europeans who relocate to Ireland are struck not by the generosity of our apartment layouts, but by how expensive and constrained they are.
The State’s chronic failure to deliver compact, high-quality urban living has long-term implications. Continued sprawl into exurban areas undermines climate goals, strains infrastructure and erodes quality of life. But so too does the prospect of a generation forced into cramped flats while paying among the highest rents in Europe.
If the housing crisis is truly a national emergency, as political leaders frequently assert, it demands bold action. But urgency must not be an excuse for abandoning standards entirely.
