Tag Archives: Clare housing

THERE are 6,241 adults and children on Clare County Council’s social housing waiting list, 2,998 of these on HAP, according to the local authority which says the county has a “robust housing delivery programme”. These details have been released as Clare Labour urge the local authority to speed up the Town Centre First plan and engage with over 80 towns and villages in Clare, saying local efforts will help to reduce numbers on the waiting list and house people. According to Dermot Hayes of Clare Labour this would help “to bring back to life unused houses/sites and repopulate these places again to bring vibrancy and thriving schools, shops and communities. Because most infrastructure is already in place in these settlements, it is cost effective to immediately connect these houses as they are reconstructed.” Clare Labour has carried out a housing survey based on data for April of this year showing 2,987 households approved for social housing support, however the party …

FOLLOWING Eddie Lenihan sharing the story of his rental nightmare in Kilkee, local councillor Cillian Murphy says it illustrates a wider problem in the seaside town. “There’s no getting away from the fact that people who want to live permanently in the town can’t get long term rentals. “Eddie isn’t the only one that we know of, I think it really crystallises what we’re losing. Here’s a guy with a job who can work remotely, can elect to live in Kilkee, they have a family and it’s a loss to the community, the kids are a loss to our schools and sporting organisations. “Eddie would have been very involved with Foróige, with the football clubs and sporting organizations, as would his wife. The social capital that that family unit brought to the town is gone. “It just shows in one family the loss to our community of not having long term rentals available and affordable housing.” Councillor Murphy said that …

SHORT term rentals has been a major factor in making housing unaffordable, not just in cities, but in places like Kilkee as well. Eddie Lenihan now lives in Adare, having had to leave Kilkee due to the near impossibility of finding a place to rent there year-round. Although a native of Limerick, he was spending much of his time in Kilkee from his earliest days. “My parents had a house down there from when I was born and I’m 42 now. I used go every Easter, Christmas, all summer. I played football there from under 14, we won a few underage titles, Kilkee is my community, it’s where I grew up, where my best friends are from. I’ve a deep connection with it.” A civil engineer, he left Ireland during the recession, but just after Eddie and his wife became parents, they moved back to West Clare, with plans to settle there that ultimately did not work out. “We were …

A STATEMENT from a government minister claiming a 44% reduction in Clare’s social housing waiting list since 2016 has been criticised as “spin” by a local councillor. In a statement issued to the Clare Champion, Housing Minister Darragh O’Brien welcomed figures published in the 2021 Summary of Social Housing Assessments (SSHA), which show a substantial reduction in the number of households on Clare’s social housing waiting list since the first annual assessment was conducted in 2016. The 2021 SSHA shows 1,100 households in Clare were assessed as being qualified for, and in need of, social housing support as of November 17, 2021. This figure is down 101 (8.4%) from 1,202 households recorded on November 2 2020. This figure also represents a total decrease of 866 (44%) households since 2016 when annual recording of the SSHA began. The minister outlined the social housing list has fallen from 1,966 in 2016 to 1,952 in 2017 and dropped to 1,004 in 2018 before …

THE Council has been requested to examine ways to make the housing waiting list and application procedure more user friendly for people not familiar with the system. The request was made via a motion at the March meeting of Clare County Council from Fianna Fáil Councillor Pat McMahon A written reply from the Council’s social directorate set out what is being done to accomplish that. “Application forms for housing support are widely available with the form itself available on the website and in the offices of Clare County Council. “Explanation material is also available in plain English to assist those with literacy issues in the completion of the form. “The form is a national template and can only be locally amended to include areas of choice relevant to County Clare. “Staff of the Council are available to support applicants in the completion of the housing application form. In addition, Citizens Information and MABS provide support to many who are seeking …

PLANNING permission was granted for 605 new residential units in Clare last year, according to figures from the Central Statistics Office. Of that number 45 were apartments, with the remainder being for houses and should all these developments be built, they would accommodate around 1600 people, going by the average household size recorded in the last census. It would be a welcome boost given the housing shortage in Clare at the moment, but Councillor Joe Cooney said that the rising costs of materials is a huge problem now. “Things are busy, but they have quietened a bit and that’s because of the cost of materials. The cost of materials has simply gone crazy. Unfortunately it’s going to prevent young people from building houses with the way it’s gone.” He said that in the last 12 months certain materials have come close to 100% increases in price, while others have seen a 30-50% jump. Despite the huge increases, he says it …

A CLARE county councillor has called on the government to give a grant of €30,000 to people building their own houses, writes Owen Ryan. THIS week’s meeting of Clare County Council heard a call from Councillor PJ Kelly for Government to be requested to introduce the grant. He said that in the past proportionally larger grants had been available. The Lissycasey man said that he had done some research and his view is that a very large proportion of the cost of building a house is the money one ends up paying to the State. “There’s a sum of €70,000 to €90,000 that anybody building a house has to pay to the State,” he claimed. He said that in addition to more obvious costs, duty on fuel, income tax on workers, and tax on profits made also goes back to the State. Councillor Kelly claimed that the €70,000 to €90,000 is “a separate mortgage to be paid back over 20 …

THE fact the local authority is prohibited from acquiring second hand houses means more and more properties will end up as holiday homes, a meeting of Clare County Council has heard.  Councillor Cillian Murphy put forward a motion asking that Clare County Council request that counties with large numbers of holiday homes be exempted from an embargo in place on acquiring houses. He said he knew of a case where a family had been reared in a local authority house. In recent times when the mother of the family had wanted to move away, she had gone to the Council first as she wanted another generation to have the option that her family had. However she was told that was not possible, as the the Council have been directed to focus on the construction of homes, and that there is a country wide embargo, with only 200 houses per annum to be purchased. Councillor Murphy said that in west Clare …