Quotes of the Week

Week starting 10.11.2008

"Our own surveys show that office rents are the only prime property sector to show a fall and that was down by only 4pc in the last quarter." Patrick Koucheravy, economist at CBRE, Irish Independent, 12.11.2008

"Commercial activity is now in the eye of the storm. In fact, the housing index bounced a bit but, essentially, still continues to trend sideways, indicating very low levels of activity." Ulster Bank economist Pat McArdle on its Construction PMI index, Irish Independent, 10.11.2008

"In more recent times it's been very hard to assess the market because nothing is selling. Although we still have a very strong residential sales department we decided we needed to plan for the future and that's how our new lettings service came about." Peter Kenny, Associate Director and head of city residential in Colliers Jackson-Stops, Sunday Tribune, 09.11.2008

"The Permanent TSB statistics, for instance, show that sales have dropped by around 9% this year. We've dropped prices by 9% in the past month to get deals done." Declan Cassidy, Managing Director of Gunne Residential, Sunday Tribune, 09.11.2008

"In the case of Irish investors, they probably decided to buy something nice a few years ago but it has now gone underwater and the banks want their money back. This is where we see the big pick-up in the market coming from." John Moran, Director of Capital Markets in Ireland for Jones Lang LaSalle, Sunday Business Post, 09.11.2008