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Home Buyers Were Duped by Their Local Authorities as Well
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Written by Patrice G. Becker   
Thursday, 22 December 2011
WE MAY be basking in an Indian summer but the skies are darkening as the chickens hatched during the Celtic Tiger come home to roost. Today, 187 families are packing their possessions and looking for somewhere to stay after the High Court ordered them to evacuate their north Dublin apartments because they are unsafe firetraps..

Priory Hall was built in 2007, when eager young people paid more than €250,000 for houses, apartments and duplexes that they bought off the plans.

One reason developers justified the extortionate house prices during the 'boom' was that they were forced to pay a hefty 'development fee' to the local authority.

And at the height of the boom, as former minister Tom Parlon pointed out recently, the State received more than 40% of the money involved in every housing transaction through VAT and taxes paid within the construction industry.

Many home buyers also paid a percentage of the value of the property in stamp duty.

So what was the role of the State and its various agents in passing these now-condemned buildings fit and safe for habitation a mere four years ago? By the way, Dublin City Council's legal department which, with the council's fire inspectors, applied for the evacuation order told the residents of Priory Hall, not to contact it for advice and to pay for their own. At least it did advise the distraught homeowners and tenants to add their names to the capital's social housing waiting list, which is already heaving with 80,000 people. When these jerrybuilt apartments were springing up all over the country, many councils were winning architectural awards for their own new civic offices.

There was hardly a local authority that did not build fantastic, safe and fireproof civic offices, using the massive income they generated during the Celtic Tiger. Most of them still charge punitive commercial rates.The truth is no council can wash its hands of responsibility in the scandal of duped housebuyers.
Last Updated ( Thursday, 22 December 2011 )