Home-buyers and the magic money trees

THE most remarkable feature of the latest housing review from Bank of Ireland is not the continued rise in house prices or the record output of new homes, but the growth of magical money trees that appear to have taken root on the property landscape.

According to the review, the size of the average mortgage taken out in 2006 will rise to €222,000 by year’s end. The average house price, meanwhile, will be €532,000 in Dublin and €395,000 in the rest of the country.

Taking the lower price, that leaves a gap of €163,000 between the amount of the mortgage cheque and the cost of the house. Taking the Dublin price, there is not so much a gap as a sprawling canyon some €310,000 wide.