Mr. Gavin Kelly:

I welcome that some of these landlords, which are buying up some of the schemes, are coming into the market. We have funded a fund coming in to build a 300 unit apartment block in Dublin. We must have a thriving, long-term rental sector. Many of these landlords bring that certainty to tenants and bring a particular quality of management to these blocks. For us, overall supply is the key. Supply, and the lack of it, is what is really putting pressure on rent. We need to get more property built, we need it built for renting and for purchase. As a bank, we would like everyone to buy a house with a mortgage because that provides us with an opportunity. However, as we touched on earlier, if someone bought an apartment today in Dublin for €350,000, they could be renting it for over €2,000 monthly. The mortgage on that same apartment would be about €1,100 or €1,200. There are costs which are picked up by the landlord, maintenance, etc., but there is around €800 difference which is €800 that could be used to save for a mortgage from us.

For us, the mix is what is important. Ms McDonagh touched on it earlier. We are funding the development of 5,500 units during 2018 and that has increased further in the last couple of months. When we were last before the committee that figure was 3,000. We are seeing much more development in building. We need a mix. Some of those developments will be for buy-to-rent in the market where funds are coming in, other developments will be for purchases for mortgage customers and people to buy a house. Ultimately, we need to see rents easing off and coming down so that customers can choose to live rental. We see it in many European cities and we will have to see it coming into Ireland, especially Dublin, with longer-term renters coming in. In order to do that there must be the right quality there from a landlord's perspective. There is room in the market for both of these stakeholders. Ultimately, that must push up those developments and numbers. Last year, 18,000 units were built in Ireland, which is welcome. We reckon that will be 22,000 or 23,000 this year and the number will continue to grow over the next two or three years. We need to see this continue to grow and see those numbers going up because all these pressures are driven by the issue around supply and we must ensure that we manage that in the right way over the next few years.