Quotes of the Week

Week starting 12.01.2009

"With yields having moved sharply upwards in 2008 and the cost of money continuing its fall from summer peaks, as time goes on it’s becoming obvious that commercial property is becoming an increasingly attractive investment for those who have the funding to make a deal in this climate." Guy Hollis, Managing Director of CB Richard Ellis in Dublin, 16.01.2009

"Pressure has been put on lenders to pass on decreases to homeowners, but buy-to-let mortgages are . . . a different category, and in most cases, the banks are not passing them on at all." Michael Dowling of the Irish Mortgage Advisers’ Federation, The Irish Times, 16.01.2009

"I believe we are coming to a point this year where that will bottom out.... We had a period where output outstripped demand and a period before that where it was very difficult to meet demand. Now we have a situation where a necessary correction is taking place." Brian Cowen, Taoiseach, Irish Independent, 15.01.2009

The bottom line for a prospective house purchaser is that it doesn't really matter where prices and interest rates are, if one is feeling very uncertain about future job security and earnings, then one will not take on a mortgage. The painful reality is that job and earnings uncertainty is now rampant." Jim Power, Economist, Friends First, Irish Independent, 15.01.2009

"The lack of publicly available information on actual sales prices puts buyers at a disadvantage as there is often a big difference between an initial asking price and the eventual selling price." Michael Grehan, Managing Director of Sherry FitzGerald, The Irish Times, 15.01.2009

"As this review of Ireland's property market in 2008 shows, asking prices for Irish property fell on average 15% during the last year. That makes 2008, in many ways, the opposite of 2006. While asking prices were static throughout 2007, the 12 months of 2008 have seen the typical home lose just over €50,000 in value, almost the exact amount gained in 2006." Ronan Lyons, Economist, Daft.ie, 14.01.2009

"Bread and butter work such as rent reviews and valuations have become the jam on what admittedly is a fairly miserable sponge." IAVI Annual Survey, The Irish Times, 14.01.2009

"It has taken us 10 years to get into this situation – it will in all likelihood take us 10 years to get out of it." Morgan Kelly, Economist, UCD, The Irish Times, 13.01.2009

"We keep telling people that this is not a V-shaped recovery. It is a recovery that is going to be over a number of years, and therefore you don’t want to be too exposed to risky assets. So don’t jump back into equities or property." Gary Dugan, Chief Investment Adviser at Merrill Lynch, The Irish Times, 13.01.2009

"This is why we have so much of a problem with development, because it has been done without infrastructure – you have to get the support of the community." Brian Gallivan, Developer, Sunday Business Post, 11.01.2009