Call for empty house tax to boost supply

The Government should consider taxing the owners of needlessly empty houses in an attempt to increase housing supply in the capital, a leading homelessness campaigner has said.

Commenting on reports that hundreds of properties are lying vacant around the city, Mike Allen of Focus Ireland told The Irish Catholic that efforts should be made to establish why so many houses are empty.

“Getting a substantial part of Dublin’s empty houses back into use should be a key part of our housing strategy,” he said, continuing, “but to do it on the scale that’s necessary the Government should introduce an empty-property tax with broad-based exemptions for reasons why people should be allowed to keep their property empty while paying a tax.”

His comments followed a call from the Peter McVerry Trust for councils to use compulsory purchase orders to buy up to 500 properties currently empty around Dublin. It is understood that just 13 properties have been acquired by Dublin councils in this way so far this year.

While sympathetic to this proposal, given the scale of the capital’s homelessness crisis, Mr Allen said CPOs can be a “heavy-handed approach”.

Situations

“You do need to recognise that there are some situations where people keep places empty as a result of other Government policies, for example when an elderly person has gone into a nursing home and the house lies empty because of the way the Fair Deal scheme works,” he said, adding that difficulties with wills can also lead to houses being empty for prolonged periods.

At the same time, he said, “there are cases where people have empty properties that are sitting there from year to year”, and that while it is “bizarre” to think there are people with empty properties who are not getting any income from their use, this seems to be a widespread reality.

A “taxation measure with a reasonably broad get-out clause” could effectively encourage people to use their empty properties or justify failures to do so, he said, criticising delays in the formulation of a Government strategy on vacant property.

Pointing out that one was promised last year, he said it is unlikely be published before the end of the summer, and said it has been “incredibly delayed”.