Quote:
Originally Posted by Swingingdoor  Can any public reps, or party hacks on this thread please inform me how they would handle the scandalous situation where there are in excess of 800 people on the council’s house waiting list in the county?
I would also be interested in learning how non- aligned party political animals on this site would handle this same issue? |
Councillors have no role in deciding how to eliminate the housing waiting lists. The Housing depart of the Council presents the Depart at Gov level with its requests for funding under different categories and based on what it receives it implements under the said headings.
Now, as to how I would deal with the housing issue, in the first instance, we are talking about the current fiscal situation and as the Gov is in breach of EU stability and growth pact rules, (EU states are required to keep their budget deficit to GDP ratio below a 3pc limit), and as the Government's borrowings will hit 5.5pc this year and 6.5pc next year, this being the case I presume that buying a stock of houses at a knock down prices is unlikely as cut backs on expenditure of a capital nature is more likely than increasing it is. So………
Firstly, I think it is a given that there are more new build units lying empty that cannot be sold here in Laois than are numbers on the housing waiting list ( an estimated 900 new units a in Portlaoise for sale and if you factor in all the units in Portarlington against a max of 1000 on the housing waiting list).
Even before the credit crunch the demand for housing had collapsed throughout the county, so we have a large supply of unwanted units owned by stressed builders with
no cashflow to service their debts. Therefore…….
The Council should be allowed to enter into full contracts to purchases the houses from the builders with closing dates from anything from 5 to 10 years down the line
at a price of around €150,000 ( 3 B/R) and take over the units now, paying a rent for the units until the closing date of the sales. The rent to be fixed at 3% to 4% interest of the purchase price (the Council are already renting units for €120 p.w. from private landlords.
What are the benefits – To The State:-
The Council clears its waiting list, leaving staff to be cut to a minimum so transferred to other areas,
Long term purchase deals at a very fair price and no costly time with the Councils engineers preparing drawings, tender documents etc to build new council schemes.
More than likely, the majority on the housing waiting lists are getting State rent allowances, so the cost is minimal and when the purchases take place with the Exchequer borrowing costs might see this cost further reduced.
Benefits for the Bank and Developer: -
Agreement from all parties ( developer / bank / council) that the income stream go directly to the bank to service the interest off the developers loan.)
On closing, the bank gets the proceeds from the sales to the Council, so a very likely bad debt is rescued and in the current climate with the very banks having undermined their own solvency by this very borrowing on day one, it reduces pressure on its own operation.
The developer, has a way out, how well he is sorted depends on the level of indebtedness in the first instance but if it saved him from liquidation or bankruptcy I cannot see how one could complain.
Finally, at the physiological level in the local economy , the ability to bring some solutions to the serious negative sentiment that is about has to do some good.
As I said at the outset we have no say in these matters, we rubber stamp end of story.
Michael Moloney MCC ( I ) Laois CC
20th November 2008
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