17-05-2021, por Peter Flanagan
Dublin’s Bulk Home Sales Spur Backlash Against Big-Money BuyersA private equity firm’s swoop for family-friendly homes sparks uproar over crowding out individual buyers.The mass purchase of affordable houses — on the market for about 400,000 euros ($490,000) — set off a public firestorm and highlights the growing tension over the squeeze in urban housing and the role of large investors.
“These big wealthy funds can swoop in and gobble up those houses that workers and families should expect to be able to afford,” said Mary Lou McDonald, who leads Sinn Fein, Ireland’s main opposition party. “No person trying to buy a home could possibly compete with them.”
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Authorities broadly welcomed their arrival for stabilizing the sector and replacing local landlords who were decimated when the fallout from 2008 financial crash dried up their funding. But in the media, investment firms have been regularly portrayed as “vultures” for buying debt and property at depressed prices and crowding out private buyers.
Even so, there are few alternative sources for that kind of capital, according to Ronan Lyons, an economist at Trinity College in Dublin who compiles the Daft.ie report on the Irish rental market.
“The presence of these investors is more part of the solution than the problem,” he said. “When we had small mom and pop landlords we didn’t want them, now we have large institutions we don’t want them either. What do we want?””
2021-05-22
