There is enough residential zoned land across the country to build 417,000 new homes, according to a new report, but much of it is not in the locations where households are situated.
The analysis by stockbroker Goodbody revealed that while just over a third of all available zoned residential land is in the east and midlands region, just under half of all households are based there.
That compares to the northern and western region where 40% of all available land is located, even though just 18% of households are situated there.
The authors of the report say that having enough zoned and serviced land available is crucial if more ambitious housing supply targets are to be achieved.
The report estimates that there is currently 7,911 hectares of residentially zoned and serviced land nationwide that does not yet have active planning associated with it.
But it predicts a shortage of zoned, serviced land in the eastern and midlands region over a six-year development plan period to meet housing requirements of 40,000 to 70,000 units.
The deficit in the southern region is thought to be 1,000 to 19,000 units.
It also questions the housing targets in the draft National Planning Framework (NPF).
"We believe the housing target of 50,000 units per annum in the draft NPF is conservative due to population household size assumptions," said Dermot O'Leary, chief economist at Goodbody.
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"And given that the location of the available residential zoned land does not match the need in the key population centres of the country, the scale of the challenge becomes apparent."
He added that the Economic and Social Research Institute has updated its population and household projection scenarios to help inform the National Planning Framework.
Its baseline scenario to 2040, Mr O’Leary said, is for the population to grow by 0.9% per annum to 2040, with growth weighted to the first part of this period to 2030.
"This sees the population reach 6.1m under its baseline scenario," he added.
"To convert this into household projections, important assumptions are made in relation to obsolescence and household size."
"The ESRI’s analysis presents a range of scenarios around these variables. However, this does not account for the existing housing deficit, estimated by the Housing Commission to be c.235,000 units."
Mr O’Leary said Goodbody shares the Housing Commission’s view that the average household size here is artificially inflated due to the lack of housing supply since the financial crisis.
"Taking account of this yields an estimate of housing requirements in excess of 50,000 per annum," he said.
"In our report, we modelled for two additional scenarios - 55,000 and 60,000 per annum."
The authors claim this is the first time a comprehensive assessment of the availability of residential zoned land provision in Ireland has been carried out.
The report uses a new dataset from the Residential Zoned Land Tax (RZLT) maps to quantify the extent of zoned, serviced land across the 31 local authorities.
It also employs analysis of the activation of residential sites from the National Residential Land Use and Activation Study, with data provided by KPMG Future Analytics.
The report also argues that while 75% of future population growth should be outside the capital and its suburbs, Dublin’s share is not out of line with other peer cities in Europe with a population under 10m.
"Overall, the eastern and midlands region accounts for 48% of households, up only three percentage points from 1979 and unchanged in the past thirty years," Mr O’Leary said.
He added that official population projections suggest that around 60% of the population growth will occur in the Eastern and Midlands region.
The analysis also found that among a sample of landbanks owned by eight large Irish homebuilders with the potential to supply 20,000 units, a significant amount was unactivated for over 15 years because of infrastructure issues.
These include roads and water, as well as social infrastructure such as schools and community facilities.
The report recommends that infrastructure plans around water, waste, broadband, electricity, roads, schools and other facilities should be coordinated across the many departments, agencies and semi-states that are responsible for these areas.
It also suggests that local authorities should add a buffer of at least 40% on the amount of serviced, residentially zoned land over and above their estimate of housing requirements.
An appropriately targeted residential zoned land tax should also be introduced to penalise the unnecessary hoarding of land and incentivise residential development, it states.
