The national average home listing price increased by an average of 5.5% throughout last year, as detailed in the most recent Daft.ie report, reports RTE.
The average price for a three-bedroom semi-detached house in the last quarter of the year stood at just over €423,000.
Report author Ronan Lyons stated there are no signs that house prices will stop rising.
“Across both list and transaction prices, it is clear that demand continues to significantly outpace supply in the sales market,” he said on RTÉ’s Morning Ireland programme, reports RTE.
“An optimist will point to the slight slowdown in inflation, with the 5.5% increase in list prices below the 6.8% seen in 2024 – and to the modest increase in availability of second-hand homes.
“However, this marks the twelfth year in a row of increasing prices. And, since the pandemic, the availability of homes to buy has become stuck at a much lower level than before – putting greater pressure on buyers,” explained Mr Lyons, reports RTE.
“The solution remains unchanged, a country that is building between 30,000 and 35,000 homes needs to double that total – across owner-occupied, social and rental segments – so that the housing reflects society, rather than society having to fit the housing stock,” he added, reports RTE.
The report highlights significant regional variations, with the lowest price growth once again recorded in Dublin, where prices rose 3.1% year-on-year.
In Connacht-Ulster, by contrast, prices increased by 11.6% during 2025.
Listed prices nationwide are now, on average, 41% higher than their pre-Covid levels and only 10% below their Celtic Tiger peak, reports RTE.
However, the average listing price for a home in Dublin has reached €611,000.
Mr Lyons noted that such market conditions lead to segregation based on income or wealth.
“If prices are that high you’re looking usually at two-income households in the top half of the income distribution who are the only ones that can afford to buy in Dublin at the moment, and that’s not a recipe for the long-term health of the city,” he said, reports RTE.
“Certainly, the last few years have opened up opportunities for people to look at different markets further away from work if they can work remotely, but people should be able to live close to where their family, friends and networks and jobs are.
“It shouldn’t be the privilege of those who are in the top part of the income distribution or indeed who inherit lots of wealth,” said Mr Lyons, reports RTE.
The report indicates that, as has been the pattern for more than a decade, price rises across the country are driven by insufficient supply, reports RTE.
On 1 December, only 11,551 second-hand homes were available for sale across the country.
Although this represents a 7% rise compared to the same date a year earlier, stock levels remain less than half the 2015-2019 average of 26,000.
Supply shortages are far more severe outside Dublin (63% below late 2010s levels) than within the capital (16% below), reports RTE.
Meanwhile, Sinn Féin Housing Spokesperson Eoin Ó Broin has stated that a rising number of young people feel “it is not going to be possible” to establish a home for themselves in Ireland.
“That is utterly unacceptable. People should be able to plan and build a future at home if that is what they want,” he said.
He argued that the housing crisis is solvable while criticising the Government’s current housing strategy, reports RTE.
Mr Ó Broin emphasised that the answer lies in delivering the right types of homes in the right locations and at affordable prices, reports RTE.
He pointed out that the existing strategy lacks sufficient social and affordable housing options.
“It is possible if the Government had the ambition and the will to deliver those affordable homes that those young people require,” he said, reports RTE.
Mr Ó Broin stressed that achieving this requires a shift in housing policy and added that his party will prioritise affordability issues when the Dáil resumes.
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