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Paul McNeive Opinion Heat pumps are set to scale up their housing presence here

In 2016 I visited developments in Scandinavia where heat pump technology is used to heat, cool and ventilate district-sized developments. Driven by new building regulations here, almost every new apartment and house built now incorporates an individual exhaust air heat pump which takes energy from the air inside the apartment and turns it into heat.

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Paul McNeive Opinion Blunt financial incentives will boost housing supply quickly

The Government has seen the light and made the correct decision in not extending the ban on evictions for residential lettings. There is already a stampede out of the market by private landlords and even the institutional landlords are unsettled.

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Paul McNeive Opinion De-zoning serviced land in a housing crisis doesn’t make sense

Chartered engineer Michael Browne, the principal at BBA architecture, a multi-disciplinary engineering and architectural practice in Co Wicklow, believes that lack of infrastructure is the major barrier to new development in Ireland.

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Paul McNeive Opinion Economic slide reignites interest in plant and machinery auctions

After years of low activity, the plant and machinery market has come roaring back to life. This specialised sector of chartered surveying generally involves experts working alongside estate agency colleagues who are selling buildings. If a property or business cannot be sold as a going concern, then the building, and the plant and machinery are sold separately. The sector usually rebounds in periods of economic downturn, and the pandemic, rising interest rates and war in Ukraine have combined to spark insolvency in certain areas.

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Paul McNeive Opinion New residential land tax shows no understanding of how market works

The new Residential Zoned Land Tax, imposing a tax of 3pc of the value of undeveloped residentially zoned land, which is deemed serviced, is another misguided effort that will probably slow new supply.

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Paul McNeive Opinion Property professionals need to talk up the value of their trade and brand

With the Society of Chartered Surveyors Ireland (SCSI) forecasting a shortage of surveyors it is encouraging that an increasing proportion of women and people in other professions are opting for careers in property. Both of these factors are a welcome response to moves by the SCSI to broaden the pathways and access to the profession, such as Earn and Learn courses which allow students to continue to work, while studying.

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Paul McNeive Opinion We need to better prepare for changing road use and make pedestrians safer

The welcome spate of new construction, together with a wave of new cycleways, bus corridors and pedestrian areas, has caused a barrage of new traffic control measures across the country.

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Paul McNeive Opinion When it comes to winning instructions, stay alert and be creative

In a tightening market, it’s clear that there will be fewer instructions for agents, architects and other professions this year. Vendors are paying more attention to getting the best value and results from their consultants and more jobs will be awarded following a competitive tender. So, what can firms do to improve their success rate?

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Paul McNeive Opinion Irish market won’t adopt measuring standards until clients buy in

A fresh effort is being made by over 80 property professions around the world, including chartered surveying, to adopt an updated International Property Measurement Standards (IPMS).

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Paul McNeive Opinion Reduced volume and higher costs point to a year of consolidation

Estate agents, developers and professions in the property industry are facing a year of consolidation, squeezed by the certainty of a reduced volume of deals, and high embedded costs.

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Paul McNeive Opinion Iput wants to put the human element back into buildings

Iput Real Estate Dublin, the property investment, development and management company, is celebrating another highly successful year in which it also won top prize in the KPMG Irish Independent Property Industry Excellence Awards.

Paul McNeive Opinion Ukraine planning its recovery with strategy to win hearts and minds

We had a lovely surprise at the KPMG Irish Independent Property Industry Excellence Awards when we discovered that a delegation from Ukraine had managed to join us. The reason was that the European Association of Real Estate Professions (CEPI) was holding its European conference in Dublin.

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Paul McNeive Opinion Cork is breaking out from under Dublin’s real estate shadow

I was in Cork last week speaking to one of the pharmaceutical companies headquartered there and I took the opportunity to update myself on the Cork market.

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Paul McNeive Opinion Commercial property valuers must adjust to an emerging new world economic order

Every day now one hears references to the performance of businesses and economies in 2019 which has become the benchmark for normality before Covid and the war in Ukraine. But, at this stage, isn’t there a risk that traditional valuation methods, referencing old information, may be becoming obsolete?

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Paul McNeive Opinion Belfast Harbour eyes major role as a centre point for the city and region

It’s probably 25 years since I first drove around Belfast Harbour. Standing on the slipway where the Titanic was launched, the potential of these 2,000 acres of land, practically in Belfast city centre, was enormous.

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Paul McNeive Opinion The Right Moves: Investing is tough as property market edges its way towards price discovery

It’s hard to think of a time when the property investment market was faced with such a complex dynamic of competing influences.

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Paul McNeive Opinion Why good client communications are paramount for estate agents

The publication of the CXi Ireland Customer Experience Report 2022 reminds me of the importance of the client’s “experience” in the world of property.

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Paul McNeive Opinion Eviction ban risks many unintended consequences for rental market

There is a dangerous level of ignorance among some politicians about how property markets function, and we have seen that in the recent debate about a ban on residential evictions. Unfortunately, policy founded on this ignorance frequently has the opposite effect to that intended. Here are some of the typical misunderstandings you will hear.

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Paul McNeive Opinion First impressions matter when you make an agency pitch in the property world

Since retiring from estate agency, I am frequently asked by family and contacts to oversee the sales of various properties.

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Paul McNeive Opinion Rates revaluation has potential to hit hard, particularly along the west coast

Approximately 34,000 rates revaluation certificates have started landing on the desks of property owners in six local authority areas.

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Paul McNeive Opinion You heard it here first – Irish construction costs are starting to come down

Remember where you read it first; construction costs are decreasing.

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Paul McNeive Opinion What’s on the Budget wish list for the property industry?

The heads of research in the estate agencies are some of the sharpest brains on our property markets. With Budget Day looming, I asked a selection, what the Government should be prioritising in the Budget:

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Paul McNeive Opinion Beware the BER: Lack of qualified assessors means vendors need to give themselves more time to prepare

Estate agents are required by law to state the Building Energy Rating (BER) of every property offered for sale or lease, whether commercial or residential, and the register of BERs is maintained by the Sustainable Energy Authority of Ireland (SEAI).

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Paul McNeive Opinion The business of self-storage could be set to explode

A pending family home move saw me seeking a self-storage unit recently, only to discover that the facilities nearest to me, in north Wicklow and south Dublin, were both full, and the next nearest had very limited availability.

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Paul McNeive Opinion When it comes to building standards, you can’t have too much of good thing

The deregulation of the supervision of new construction, in the Building Control Acts from 1990, must be one of the most catastrophic follies ever undertaken by Government. Experts warned of dire consequences, but could hardly have predicted the scale of the disaster laid out in the Expert Working Group Report on Defects in Housing.

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Paul McNeive Opinion London rebound foreshadows a different kind of market for Ireland

Looking south over the London skyline from a Piccadilly hotel this week, I was struck by the relatively few cranes in view. I wondered if construction activity had reduced, but a discussion with Mat Oakley, Director of Commercial Research at Savills London, painted a different picture.

Paul McNeive Opinion Forget the lull, in this market agents must keep on top of their cash flow

As we approach the holiday season, and with economic uncertainty in the air, it’s important that agents do not allow the recent sustained good run to have diluted their awareness of credit control.

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Paul McNeive Opinion Innovation is key to help an industry now facing into a ‘perfect storm’

The BNP Paribas Real Estate Ireland Construction PMI report tells us that June saw the first reduction in construction activity since pandemic restrictions were lifted. Most of the contraction is in the commercial property sector and largely reflects the effect of rapid cost inflation.

Brexit impact is now reshaping Dublin Port permanently as traffic patterns shift

Brexit has accelerated the pace of change at Dublin Port, Cormac Kennedy, Head of Property at Dublin Port Company told me as he showed me around the new “Inland Port” on the M50/M2 junction, near Dublin airport.

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Paul McNeive Opinion High-profile shopping streets need to have the right balance

A high-profile row on London’s Oxford Street between Marks & Spencer (M&S) and the UK government has lessons for Ireland and underlines the balancing act required in planning our city streets. M&S secured planning approval to demolish its 1930s art-deco headquarters and to replace it with a 10-storey retail and office building.