€10bn needed to ease problems in affordable housing

OVER €10 billion must be invested in social and affordable housing over the next eight years to tackle the problems in this end of the market, a new economic report has recommended.

This money is needed to build 73,000 low-cost houses to close the increasing gap between supply and demand, according to the National Economic and Social Council (NESC).

The State, in partnership with voluntary housing groups and private enterprise, must build the houses at a cost of at least €1.4bn a year up to 2012, the NESC report on Housing in Ireland: Performance and Policy states.