Catherine Murphy (Kildare North, Social Democrats) | Oireachtas source

I also raise the role of the international investment funds in displacing individuals and families from purchasing a home. Last week, the example occurred in Maynooth, in Mullen Park housing estate, which is well under construction at this stage. I started getting calls and emails late last week from constituents on this. Each one of them had signed up with an estate agent expressing an interest in purchasing a home. They would have been watching the development as it was progressing. They would have been looking forward to the day when they would have been contacted and asked to pay a deposit on a house. Those hopes were dashed last week when the auctioneers sent them an email to say that Round Hill Capital would be buying the rest of the estate.

The developer had no shortage of buyers. Individuals wished to purchase, as did Kildare County Council and Tuath Housing association. However, they were all dumped in favour of Round Hill Capital. The same company also purchased 112 family homes in Bay Meadows, Hollystown and 297 apartments in Northwood, Dublin. They will now come on the market at extortionate rents.

Round Hill Capital claims to have €1 billion to spend on residential property in Ireland. It is just one of dozens of investors competing for this limited supply of housing. Since 2018, nearly €4 billion has been invested by global funds in the Irish residential market. In 2019, international funds bought a staggering 95% of the apartments that were constructed that year. How are ordinary buyers, who scrimp and save for a mortgage, supposed to compete with this?

There is no mystery as to why these funds are outbidding ordinary buyers because they are being advantaged by the State. As has been said, they pay no stamp duty, no capital gains tax and no corporation tax. I listened to the Minister for Housing, Local Government and Heritage yesterday talk about not doing anything radical. He was concerned about unintended consequences. It begs the question: is what happened in Maynooth an unintended consequence? It is not just that estate in Maynooth; another estate in Maynooth went the same way some months ago.

There is a skewed ideology at play here. The Taoiseach must tell us when there will be a change in this. It cannot be put off until the budget. If we need to, every one of us can sit over a weekend or overnight to pass legislation to stop this. It is not just that they are buying these estates, but we will find that the State will be on the other side with long leases over 25 years where they will be leased, refurbished and returned to the developer at the end of it.

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