Eoghan Murphy (Dublin Bay South, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

What we are trying to do with co-living is to bring another choice into our housing market for young professionals who have seen this type of accommodation solution in other cities.

We want to ensure there is enough choice in order that people can have a choice of where they live. They do not have that at the moment. That is the real difficulty that many people face in the housing sector today. There is no choice for how they want to live, where they want to live. I admit there is not huge demand for it but there is some demand. If we can accommodate 250 people in new co-living homes over the next 12 months, that will free up other accommodation, houses or apartments that people can rent. Between 21,000 and 23,000 new homes will be built this year and perhaps 1% or not even that might be for co-living. It is meeting a small demand, which will take pressure off other parts of the market. We must look at this in totality. We are not trying to replace social housing with this or to bring back bedsits, it is just bringing an option that we know has worked abroad into the Irish housing market.

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