Dáil Éireann Debate, Thursday - 18 December 2025
507. Deputy Seán Ó Fearghaíl asked the Minister for Housing, Local Government and Heritage the key measures taken to tackle vacancy and dereliction during 2025; his priorities for 2026; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [73537/25]
View answerWorking to end dereliction and vacancy is a key priority in the Government's new housing plan, Delivering Homes, Building Communities. The Plan will ensure that the activities and resources used to address vacancy and dereliction are co-ordinated, and that legislative powers are used proactively to work to bring dereliction and vacancy to an end.
The range of initiatives and funding mechanisms introduced in recent years are set out in the Vacant Homes Action Plan and they are successfully reducing the levels of vacancy and dereliction right across the country.
A key measure is the Vacant Property Refurbishment Grant, introduced in July 2022. The grant provides up to €70,000 for the refurbishment of vacant and derelict properties for occupation as a principal private residence and for properties which will be made available for rent. There has been significant interest in the grant since its launch, with over 15,600 applications made to local authorities to date and over €230 million of grant funding paid out across the country.
This week I announced a new enhanced support package of up to €140,000 to bring vacant ‘above shop’ space in our cities, towns and villages into use as homes, which will be made available in Q1 next year.
This year, my Department has been engaging with the national statistical institute, the Central Statistics Office, which has recently developed a new statistical release on residential vacancy. The release, published in September, provides information on the extent of residential vacancy in 2022 and 2023, using ESB data on residential electricity consumption, with future regular publications planned. In the release, the CSO note a national vacancy rate of 3.3% at the end of 2023, down from 3.6% at the end of 2022. Local authority and local electoral level breakdowns are also included.
The CPO Activation Programme, launched in 2023, requires local authorities to take a proactive, systematic approach to identifying and activating vacant and derelict properties. It includes use of their compulsory purchase powers under the Derelict Sites Act and the Housing Act, when engagement with the owners of these properties is not successful in bringing them back into use.
In October, my Department published data for 2023 and 2024 on the CPO Activation Programme on its website, which includes the number of properties that entered the Programme, the number of compulsory purchase/acquisitions commenced and the number of compulsory purchase/acquisitions completed per local authority. This data can be accessed at the following link: assets.gov.ie/static/documents/bdfef028/CPO_Activation_Programme_-_LA_use_of_CPO_powers.pdf
Call 3 of the Urban Regeneration and Development Fund (URDF), as well as Social Housing Investment Programme funding, is able to provide the finance required to compulsorily acquire properties in support of the local authority’s wider CPO Activation Programme targets. To date, over 1,370 properties have now been approved for local authority's URDF Call 3 programmes, with an estimated residential yield of over 5,600 homes.
Delivering Homes, Building Communities reinforces and expands the range of measures being implemented by Government to work to end dereliction and long term vacancy.
As well as the new Above the Shop Grant and other measures, a new Derelict Property Tax will be introduced, to be administered and collected by the Revenue Commissioners, to bring derelict properties back into use.
Under the Living City Initiative, a tax incentive scheme to encourage people to live in ‘special regeneration areas’, tax relief can be claimed for money spent on refurbishing or converting residential or commercial buildings. The aim of the initiative is to bring back life into the heart of the relevant cities and towns by encouraging people to convert suitable properties. Budget 2026 extended the Living City Initiative to 2030, and expanded it to include residential properties built before 1975 and the towns of Athlone, Drogheda, Dundalk, Letterkenny and Sligo.
I firmly believe the commitment Government has made to addressing vacancy and dereliction and the actions under Delivering Homes, Building Communities will play a vital role in delivering homes across the country.
