Two out of every three new homes are being bought by investors, not owner occupiers. This information is contained in the Department of the Environment and Local Government's Housing Statistics Bulletin. The bulletin, for the first quarter of the year, was published yesterday.
This change in buying patterns follows the return of investors into the housing market after last December's budget measures.
The bulletin also says that there has been an increase of 12% in the average mortgage over the same period last year. House prices have risen by 5.8% at most - this means that people or investors are borrowing more and more money to buy houses.
In tandem with this, fewer and fewer people are opting to go with fixed term mortgages. In 1997 two out of every three mortgages were fixed rate. This is now down to less than one in two.
Dublin remains the most expensive place to buy a home in Ireland - the price of a house there has doubled over the last four years. Waterford is the cheapest. The average cost of a second hand house in Dublin is €274,714, while in Waterford it is just €160,038.
Limerick is second cheapest while Cork is the second most expensive county to buy a home in.
Analysts say the latest bulletin from the Government confirms that the heat is going out of the housing market. In 1998 house prices went up by 40%, then in 2000 that slowed to 15% and now it is down to around 5%.
Over the last decade, house prices have gone up three times faster than the average wage and five times faster than inflation.
Builders profit margins are also being eaten into, the bulletin reveals. The cost of building a house has gone up by 40% since 1997 while the price of the same house went up by 85%. However, the statistics show that their margins are being slightly eroded.
