THE Government will miss its own housing targets for the next three years in a row, according to a new forecast from the Central Bank.
The Central Bank of Ireland will today publish its first quarterly bulletin for 2025 which warns of economic uncertainty in the years ahead due to US President Donald Trump’s tariff wars.
The Government will miss their own housing targets for the next three years in a row, according to the Central Bank[/caption]
A new report forecasts that housing completions will hit 35,000 this year[/caption]
However, the report also looks at key areas for the economy including housing where the Bank’s experts are predicting housing completions for the next three years that are way below the Government’s targets.
The Central Bank predicts a rise in the number of houses built in Ireland but warns that “overall investment is forecast to remain below required levels based on population growth and household formation.”
The report forecasts that housing completions will hit 35,000 this year followed by 40,000 next year and 44,000 in 2027.
This is far below the Government’s projected targets for the next three years.
The Government’s target for 2025 is 41,000 homes followed by 43,000 in 2026 and 48,000 in 2027.
These figures were set out in a briefing document provided to the new Minister for Housing James Browne when he took up the role earlier this year.
The Department of Housing initially hid these housing targets from the public by redacting part of the document that was published online.
However, in a subsequent version of the briefing document provided to the Irish Sun through the Freedom of Information act, the table was not redacted.
The Central Bank’s prediction would see the Government fail to hit their own housing targets for the next three years.
The targets in the Minister’s briefing were based on decisions made by the last government along with the commitment in the Programme for Government to deliver 300,000 homes between 2025 and 2030.
The Central Bank claim their “downward revisions” of how many houses will be built in Ireland over the next three years are based on the poor performance in 2024.
In the run-up to the election in November, Government Ministers including current Taoiseach Micheal Martin had claimed that Ireland would build around 40,000 new homes by the end of 2024.
However, in actuality only 30,330 homes were built last year – a 6.7 per cent fall in the number of houses built in 2023.
The Central Bank said: “Although housing commencements rose by almost 69,000 units in 2024, there is uncertainty over the proportion of these commencements that are likely to result in completed dwellings in the period out to 2027.”
Earlier this month, Housing Minister Browne stood by the housing targets set by the last Government in the Dail.
A spokesperson for the Department of Housing told the Irish Sun: “As we have seen in the past, projections and predictions regarding housing delivery can vary greatly amongst commentators and we will have a much clearer picture as the year proceeds.”
