Eoin Ó Broin (Dublin Mid West, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I have a final question on the financing model, just so that I understand it. One of the principles of cost rental is full cost recovery. The idea is that at a certain point the full cost of financing and delivering the product is meant to be paid down. I may be simplifying it, but let us take the example of a single unit, whatever the price of that unit may be, of which I am the tenant. I pay my rent each month.

Obviously, tax has to be paid on that rent roll. That tax is paid, so 75% of the rent I pay is left after the passive rate of income tax for commercial landlords has been taken, if that is the tax paid by the LDA. What I am trying to work out is where that money actually goes month on month. Mr. Coleman is telling me a small bit of it is the return. Is that a small or a significant bit of the rent I pay? Obviously, as well, there are management and maintenance costs, etc., which are not paying down the cost of delivering the unit. Will these units ever be paid for?

I ask this because this is a very different model of financing than any of the cost-rent models we have come across, not just in Ireland but elsewhere as well. I am trying to work this out, because otherwise the only way the LDA can continue to deliver more homes, unless interest rates for borrowing come down, is if the State just keeps piling in more equity through the Ireland Strategic Investment Fund, ISIF, or the secure tenancy affordable rental investment, STAR, scheme. In terms of the rent each tenant pays after tax, where does the remainder of the money go?