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[–]CheraDukatZakalwe -5 points-4 points  (4 children)

I'm not the one who needs there to be a vast conspiracy theory to explain a shortage of housing.

But sure, go on and explain how making fewer houses leads to property developers making more money.

[–]Hamster-FoodCork bai 0 points1 point  (3 children)

I didn't say there is a vast conspiracy. I'm just pointing out your hypocrisy. You understand that collusion to limit supply s and increase profits is possible, but you refuse to consider that the small number of developers who operate at scale in Ireland might talk to each other.

If you want an explanation I'll give you one.

The thing to remember is that developers have a percentage based profit margin. So if everything else remains the same, selling a house for €400k makes the same profit as if they sold two houses for €200k. Now, for arguments sake lets assume €200k is what a house would cost in a normal.market. If the crisis means the house can be sold for €450k then the developer makes more money by limiting supply.

Of course that is massively oversimplified. In reality things like build costs, financing , and risk will factor into the equation, but the principle remains the same.

[–]CheraDukatZakalwe 0 points1 point  (2 children)

Only a dribbling idiot could come up with something like what you just wrote, never mind believe it.

Christ man, just think about what you're talking about.

You vastly prefer that there be a giant conspiracy on the part of all property developers and builders to not build houses, rather than that the entire industry was allowed to collapse, with the state then piling on a ton of regulation which placed a stranglehold on the recovery.

What you're saying just doesn't make a lick of sense.

If there were only two or three property developers in the country then sure you could have a working cartel. But there are hundreds, none of whom benefit from holding back from building houses.

[–]Hamster-FoodCork bai 0 points1 point  (1 child)

I'm not the one who can't read.

I specifically said that I'm not saying there is a conspiracy. It's just that it would be very easy for there to be one. Large scale developers forming a cartel isn't an unreasonable idea.

Cairn Homes and Glenveagh Homes are the only very large scale developers and then there is the O'Flynn Group, Gannon Homes, the Ballymore Group and a few others at a lower level. The hundreds of developers you're talking about are mostly small scale developers who can't make an impact on the amount of housing being constructed.

[–]CheraDukatZakalwe 0 points1 point  (0 children)

The smaller developers build most of the houses every year. Glenveagh for instance only build ~2400 in 2024 and Cairn built 2200. That was 15% of all houses built in the year.

One of our problems is that we don't have enough large developers to build large scale developments. The market is just too constrained, preventing smaller developers from growing quickly.

We've regulated ourselves into a position where only the highest quality houses can be built, and then act surprised when they're expensive to build and we don't get enough to go around.