The above headline comes from an Irish Times article I read through today. See more HERE.
Here are the key facts I stripped from the article for better clarity:
- Average rent (Ireland) – €1,366/month
- Minimum wage monthly income (gross) – €2,391
- Rent share of income – 57.2% (2nd highest in the EU after Malta with 61.3%!)
Dublin
- Average rent – €2,697
- Required income share – 112% of minimum wage
- Deficit – €306/month
Comparison to other EU Nations
- Poland Rent share of income – 33%
- France Rent share of income – 38.1%
Social Impact
- 42.2% of 25–34-year-olds are forced to continue living with their parents
- 64.9% of them are working full-time
- Only 1% of under-30s live alone in Ireland (vs 35% in Norway)
Anyone can clearly see that even though Ireland has one of the highest minimum wages in the EU, it does not translate into real living power at all! When a full-time worker in a country like Ireland (which has incredibly high levels of education and seems to be doing incredibly well on paper) cannot afford a place to sleep, then work is no longer a part to independence. It is only an effort to barely survive.
Unfortunately, this will only get worse, as long as housing continues to be treated as a financial asset first and a necessity second. This is truly saddening.
With stats such as the above, it is clear to me that there is a clear mismatch between who housing is being built for and who actually needs it – because if we are to take recent news reports at face value, then houses are actually being built across Ireland.
Also, if full-time workers cannot afford to rent a simple home in dignity, then housing provision MUST partially move back into State control.
Structural imbalance that requires Structural intervention.
I cannot see it any other way.
Why the 14BN Apple Tax Portion of the National Development Plan is a Vital Catalyst to Fixing the Housing Crisis.
If you have been here before, you could tell I would bring this up eventually.
The €14bn Apple tax windfall, which was finally collected in full by the Irish Government in July 2025, is a once-off, non-recurring amount of money.
- It was money that was owed to the Irish State since 2016 by a multinational corporation, Apple Inc.
- This tax was not paid or borne by the common taxpayer; so this fund could be used as an incredible PR tool to help Irish politicians score much-needed political points with the Irish Public while helping them at the same time.
- The Apple Tax is not a foreign loan, so there are no state obligations or strings attached to a foreign lender.
The above reasons are precisely why the Apple Tax should be allocated specifically as a catalyst to resolve the Irish housing emergency, rather than being stored away in the well-intentioned but non-urgent National Development Plan (NDP), where the money now sits.
What Government Intervention Could Actually Look Like in Practice.
If we assume that the real goal is helping Irish residents, then the money needs to be used in ways that change how the system behaves.
1. National State-Led Construction (Especially in Modular & MMC)
The Irish Government could :
- Fund tens of thousands of homes directly
- Use modular / MMC techniques to accelerate housing delivery
- Focus more on cost-rental and social housing
I believe this matters because it could add supply quickly, stabilise prices by setting a lower price benchmark for the Irish housing market, and most importantly – reducing Ireland’s over-dependence on private developers!
Various attempts at capping rents in Ireland have clearly not worked.
So why not try to bring down prices by ‘directly competing with the private market?‘ 🤷♂️
2. Empower Local Councils to Buy, Refurbish & Activate Suitable Vacant & Derelict Housing
It is my belief that if done correctly, it is far easier to bring vacant & derelict houses back into the market instead of building new homes from scratch. There are tens of thousands of underused properties across Ireland.
The state could use the fund to:
- Allocate budgets to local councils, and allow them to buy suitable properties from willing sellers, repair those homes and add them to their social housing stock
- Any income from the rents collected can be reinvested back into affordable public housing
This could revitalise communities greatly and reduce urban pressure ever so slightly.
3. Local Infrastructure Support
Now, building public housing at scale is pointless if the infrastructure is not there to support it, ie, transport, water, electricity etc.
As of 2022, 37% of treated water in Ireland was lost through leaks every day due to aged mains. That is 600 million litres of treated water everyday!!
This is very inefficient, and the scale of this problem is a serious obstacle to future housing development.
Now, Uisce Éireann aims to reduce this leakage rate to 25% by 2030 through its Leakage Reduction Programme – and I think the state should support this directly using this fund.
- Various reports have also exposed inadequate transport links, combined with wider infrastructure deficits in electricity, as severely hindering housing delivery at scale in Ireland.
This Apple fund could be a starting step in reducing these deficits, even by just a little.
4. Improve Local Authority Staffing & Planning System
Even with money available, public housing delivery will not succeed at scale if:
- Local councils are severly understaffed
- Planning approval processes are still inefficient or suffer long judicial reviews and delays
Investment in these areas may appear less visible, but they are very critical.
FINAL WORDS
Now, the above ideas are just me thinking out loud – all in the hopes that industry experts who are much better at this kind of stuff than I am could improve on these ideas and make a better case for Government to mobilise this 14bn immediately.
This money will not solve the housing crisis, but it has the potential to be a real catalyst that gets the ball rolling for real.
I truly believe that mobilising this money is not impossible. The main issue here – and this is a tale as old as time – is that policy-makers are always unwilling to accept short-term political risk for long-term structural gain.
But at this point, what else have we got to lose?
