John Brady (Wicklow, Sinn Fein)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

255. To ask the Minister for Finance the number of vacant NAMA owned properties here, by county, in tabular form; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [41666/16]

Michael Noonan (Limerick City, Fine Gael)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

The Deputy will appreciate that NAMA does not own or manage properties.  NAMA has acquired loans.  The properties securing those loans continue to be managed by their legal owners or, in the case of enforcement, by duly appointed insolvency practitioners.  Insolvency practitioners such as receivers and administrators act as agents of the original owners of the properties, not as agents of NAMA. 

I am advised that NAMA, in its capacity as secured lender, currently has exposure to 173 residential properties which are temporarily vacant.  I am further advised, by NAMA, that these properties are currently on the market for sale, with many already sale agreed, or are between tenancies. Therefore, those 173 properties represent frictional vacancy and NAMA debtors and receivers expect these to be occupied quickly.

The fact that there are so few vacant properties in the NAMA portfolio reflects NAMA's stated policy of ensuring that houses and apartments are made available to potential purchasers or tenants in a timely fashion.

The Deputy will be aware that NAMA is making a very substantial contribution to new housing supply in the main urban centres, particularly Dublin, through its residential development funding programme which is aimed at facilitating, on a commercial basis, the construction of 20,000 new houses and apartments by 2020. 

The breakdown sought by the Deputy is set out in the following table.

Temporarily vacant NAMA-related residential property, by County