Peadar Tóibín (Meath West, Aontú)
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38. To ask the Minister for Housing, Planning, and Local Government the number of applications that have been made under the home loan scheme. [46924/22]

Darragh O'Brien (Dublin Fingal, Fianna Fail)
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The Local Authority Home Loan has been available nationwide from local authorities since 4 January 2022 for first-time buyers and fresh start applicants. The loan can be used both for new and second-hand properties, or to self-build. It is the successor to the Rebuilding Ireland Home Loan (RIHL).

The Housing Agency provides a central support service that assesses applications for the Local Authority Home Loan on behalf of local authorities and makes recommendations to the authorities to approve or refuse applications.

The final decision on loan approval is a matter for the relevant local authority and its credit committee on a case-by-case basis.  Decisions on all housing loan applications must be made in accordance with the Regulations establishing the scheme and the credit policy that underpins the scheme, in order to ensure prudence and consistency in approaches in the best interests of both borrowers and the lending local authorities.  

The most recent figures provided by the Housing Agency up to the end of August 2022 show that there have been 1,483 Local Authority Home Loan applications assessed so far in 2022.

My Department regularly publishes information on the number and value of (i) local authority loan approvals and (ii) local authority loan drawdowns. Local authority approval means that an official letter of offer has been sent to a borrower (and therefore relates to a specific property and loan amount). 

Local Authority drawdowns, approvals, average drawdowns, and average approvals to Q1 2022 are available at the following link, which will be updated as soon additional figures are available: 

www.gov.ie/en/collection/42d2f-local-authority-loan-activity/#local-authority-loans-approvedpaid.