Ciarán Lynch (Cork South Central, Labour) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Office of the Ceann Comhairle for granting me the opportunity to discuss with the Minister for Justice and Equality what I believe would enhance the operation of the residential property price register. I commend the Minister on implementing the measure in this regard. I have called for it for many years. It was in the Labour Party's manifesto prior to the last general election and it is in the programme for Government. It is one of many commitments in the programme for Government that have been achieved to date.

The purpose of the residential property price register is to normalise the housing market and to give accurate and clear information to house purchasers. The obvious question that needs to be asked this evening concerns why it has taken so long to arrive at this position.

The United Nations, as part of its programme in developing countries and eastern European countries that are restructuring their social and private residential housing sectors, has as a basic criterion the putting in place of a house price database. This is because the absence of such a database is one of the most significant causes of house price bubbles, such as that experienced in Ireland. In this State, estate agents, valuers and others overinflated the prices of property.

They were advertised in newspapers and it became a major income stream for newspapers across the country. They were advertising prices above the market value and there was no clear information for purchasers on the true value, which gave rise to a compound effect that resulted in house prices increasing indefinitely. Now that the register has been established, there are some measures that could be introduced to improve it. I would welcome the Minister taking on board some of the suggestions I will make.

When a property is sold, there is no indication whether it is an apartment, a house - whether it be an end of terrace, gable end or mid-terrace house - or the square footage involved. There is no information other than its value. When people log onto the website, as many do - it has proved to be very successful in terms of public access - all they see is a valuation of the property. That is fine if one knows the type of property at which one is looking, but the website does not include a general scheme of the house, nor does it give the relative value.

I propose to the Minister that, as part of the conveyancing completion process - I know the information is assimilated by the Revenue Commissioners and sent to the database - including some additional boxes to be ticked in the system would allow for an indication to be given as to whether a property is a house or an apartment and has one or three bedrooms, as to the square footage and so forth. That would lend itself to allowing more accurate information to be provided and achieve the goal we want to achieve in the residential property market, namely, to ensure people are given accurate information and pay realistic prices for their homes.

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