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Ireland are a complete outlier, as the government incentivised itself not to deliver on housing as a result of IMF/Troika bullying. It set up National Asset Man

Ireland are a complete outlier, as the government incentivised itself not to deliver on housing as a result of IMF/Troika bullying. It set up National Asset Management Agency in 2009 to clean the property crash related debts from the balance sheets of the main Irish banks. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Asset_Management_Agency https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Asset_Management_Agen... As per the usual government mouthpieces, it was a roaring success - "NAMA's overall contribution of €10.5 billion to the State, comprising its projected surplus €4.9 billion and recoupment of the €5.6 billion of state aid it paid to the participating institutions, represents a significant outperformance relative to expectations at inception in late 2009" https://www.rte.ie/news/business/2024/0306/1436280-nama-ibrc-wind-down-dates/ https://www.rte.ie/news/business/2024/0306/1436280-nama-ibrc... Sadly it has resulted in arguably the worst housing crisis in the EU. 68 per cent of people aged between 25-29 in Ireland still live at home. This figure is nearly 26 per cent higher than the EU average of 42.1.

returningfory2 2y ago
What is the connection between the Irish housing crisis and NAMA?
- piltdownman 2y ago
  The tl;dr version is encapsulated here; can't post an archive link as on the work VPN https://thecurrency.news/articles/86599/we-had-our-chance-to-stop-the-housing-crisis-it-was-called-nama/ https://thecurrency.news/articles/86599/we-had-our-chance-to...
Supernaut 2y ago
NAMA is not in any way responsible for the housing crisis. Its purpose was not ever to fund or incentivize homebuilding and in any case, if I think back a decade, to a point where NAMA had been in operation for five years, there was no housing crisis. Neither NAMA nor the Troika ever discouraged housebuilding. Even if it had been a policy of theirs, there wouldn't have been any need: a sizeable proportion of the building companies here went bust after the 2008 crash and their employees had to emigrate or retrain. Furthermore, none of the local banks were in the financial position (or the mood) to fund property development. The Irish housing crisis has very simply and abruptly come about because of the massive growth in population that has occurred here over the last nine or ten years. Due to the catastrophic implosion that occurred in the indigenous building industry after 2008, speedily ramping homebuilding up to a level that can keep pace with inward migration is essentially impossible. We may eventually be able to build fifty thousand dwellings a year, but the shortages will persist until then. There are other factors that exacerbate the problem, most notably our sclerotic planning system, but the fundamental issue is the hollowing out of the private construction sector that occurred at the start of the last decade.
- piltdownman 2y ago
  I never claimed its aim was to fund or incentivize housebuilding - in fact not only was NAMA emblematic of the overall government policy to restrict supply in order to re-bolster its portfolio of residential housing in deep negative-equity, it also played a significant role in worsening the housing crisis through its sale of assets to real estate investment trusts (REITs). https://www.irishtimes.com/opinion/housing-crisis-why-nama-should-be-asked-to-do-more-to-alleviate-the-shortage-1.2017674 https://www.irishtimes.com/opinion/housing-crisis-why-nama-s... You can think back a decade as you say, but your recollection isn't in accordance with the recorded protests at the time https://www.independent.ie/news/protesters-call-for-nama-funds-to-be-used-to-resolve-housing-crisis/34139865.html https://www.independent.ie/news/protesters-call-for-nama-fun... Dr Rory Hearne's research from Maynooth sums it up brilliantly "The housing crisis has also been caused by wider government policy from 2010 to encourage the entry of global investors and vulture funds (via various tax incentives, lobbying and fire sale of assets) into Ireland in order to offload toxic loans from NAMA and the banks. Rising house prices and rents post 2013 were also viewed positively and were promoted as an enticement to investors, while rising prices and rents were also viewed positively for rehabilitating the balance sheets of the banks, a core aim of all policy post 2008. The impact on the housing system was not considered an issue, despite myself and others highlighting the potential problems. We can see now that these policies have contributed directly to the crisis with vulture funds hoarding land purchased from NAMA. Vulture funds are more likely to repossess houses in mortgage arrears and raise rents on buy to let properties (for example, Ireland's biggest landlord Ires Reit has raised rents substantially). The increase in investors purchasing homes means they are competing with potential home owners. We need to cool off this speculative inflow of investors into our housing system (investors bought up to a fifth of all homes in 2017) and extend the vacant sites tax to derelict property and increase it further to force either sale or development." https://www.maynoothuniversity.ie/research/spotlight-research/why-fixing-irelands-housing-crisis-requires-change-policy https://www.maynoothuniversity.ie/research/spotlight-researc...

returningfory2 2y ago

What is the connection between the Irish housing crisis and NAMA?

piltdownman 2y ago
The tl;dr version is encapsulated here; can't post an archive link as on the work VPN https://thecurrency.news/articles/86599/we-had-our-chance-to-stop-the-housing-crisis-it-was-called-nama/ https://thecurrency.news/articles/86599/we-had-our-chance-to...

Supernaut 2y ago

NAMA is not in any way responsible for the housing crisis. Its purpose was not ever to fund or incentivize homebuilding and in any case, if I think back a decade, to a point where NAMA had been in operation for five years, there was no housing crisis. Neither NAMA nor the Troika ever discouraged housebuilding. Even if it had been a policy of theirs, there wouldn't have been any need: a sizeable proportion of the building companies here went bust after the 2008 crash and their employees had to emigrate or retrain. Furthermore, none of the local banks were in the financial position (or the mood) to fund property development. The Irish housing crisis has very simply and abruptly come about because of the massive growth in population that has occurred here over the last nine or ten years. Due to the catastrophic implosion that occurred in the indigenous building industry after 2008, speedily ramping homebuilding up to a level that can keep pace with inward migration is essentially impossible. We may eventually be able to build fifty thousand dwellings a year, but the shortages will persist until then. There are other factors that exacerbate the problem, most notably our sclerotic planning system, but the fundamental issue is the hollowing out of the private construction sector that occurred at the start of the last decade.

piltdownman 2y ago
I never claimed its aim was to fund or incentivize housebuilding - in fact not only was NAMA emblematic of the overall government policy to restrict supply in order to re-bolster its portfolio of residential housing in deep negative-equity, it also played a significant role in worsening the housing crisis through its sale of assets to real estate investment trusts (REITs). https://www.irishtimes.com/opinion/housing-crisis-why-nama-should-be-asked-to-do-more-to-alleviate-the-shortage-1.2017674 https://www.irishtimes.com/opinion/housing-crisis-why-nama-s... You can think back a decade as you say, but your recollection isn't in accordance with the recorded protests at the time https://www.independent.ie/news/protesters-call-for-nama-funds-to-be-used-to-resolve-housing-crisis/34139865.html https://www.independent.ie/news/protesters-call-for-nama-fun... Dr Rory Hearne's research from Maynooth sums it up brilliantly "The housing crisis has also been caused by wider government policy from 2010 to encourage the entry of global investors and vulture funds (via various tax incentives, lobbying and fire sale of assets) into Ireland in order to offload toxic loans from NAMA and the banks. Rising house prices and rents post 2013 were also viewed positively and were promoted as an enticement to investors, while rising prices and rents were also viewed positively for rehabilitating the balance sheets of the banks, a core aim of all policy post 2008. The impact on the housing system was not considered an issue, despite myself and others highlighting the potential problems. We can see now that these policies have contributed directly to the crisis with vulture funds hoarding land purchased from NAMA. Vulture funds are more likely to repossess houses in mortgage arrears and raise rents on buy to let properties (for example, Ireland's biggest landlord Ires Reit has raised rents substantially). The increase in investors purchasing homes means they are competing with potential home owners. We need to cool off this speculative inflow of investors into our housing system (investors bought up to a fifth of all homes in 2017) and extend the vacant sites tax to derelict property and increase it further to force either sale or development." https://www.maynoothuniversity.ie/research/spotlight-research/why-fixing-irelands-housing-crisis-requires-change-policy https://www.maynoothuniversity.ie/research/spotlight-researc...