An answer to Ireland’s housing crisis is right behind us

When you are in a crisis, the choice is never between good and bad – it’s always between bad and worse.

Ireland has a housing crisis. We have far too many people and not enough homes for them. We can’t seem to build quickly enough in the right areas at the right price. All the while, rising rent and house prices are prompting tens of thousands of young educated Irish people to emigrate.

As argued here last month, our immigration policy is giving out too many work visas relative to the economy’s ability to house these new migrants. There is too little supply and too much demand. The solution must include a reduction in immigration rates and a simultaneous increase in home building.

In the short term, all bottlenecks to building should be removed while the number of people coming into the country needs to be capped, which means identifying a number for sustainable migration and sticking to it for a specific time period.

Facing a crisis resolutely is often described as the “Dunkirk strategy”, where you achieve your goals however you can, galvanising all your resources. At Dunkirk, rather than waiting for navy frigates to evacuate the stranded British army, the war cabinet commandeered every boat possible – fishing boats, yachts, pleasure boats, the lot. The objective in the crisis was: do whatever necessary.

One housing-related idea under discussion is the notion that Irish people should be allowed (or even encouraged) to build small homes in their back gardens for the family to alleviate the pressure on the rental market. As long as the homes are within a specific size and meet some specific guidelines, families should be allowed to do what they want, right?

This seems pretty sensible and, while it is hardly a universal solution, as an incremental move it’s a start. The back gardens of many homes are potentially an amazing resource. In place of Nimbyism, living in the garden could be the start of a Yimbyism movement: yes in my back yard.

Although some have voiced opposition, the international evidence is overwhelmingly positive. Allowing people to build in their back garden creates reasonably priced homes in the right areas. In North America, removing planning barriers in recent years has unleashed huge growth in small garden homes. For example, in three years Seattle tripled its permits to build what they call secondary dwelling units. In California, permits surged by 15,334 per cent. In Vancouver today, roughly 35 per cent of single-family lots host a laneway or secondary suite. These are families taking the housing crisis into their own hands and building in their gardens. Why would you stop them?

In the Irish context, how big might this garden housing opportunity be?

The Dublin City Council area contains about 3,305 hectares of private gardens. To give you a sense of how big this is, consider 8,262 Croke Parks. Now you get the picture. These are already residential-zoned, serviced plots located in prime, established urban areas. By contrast, empty brownfield sites are scarce in Ireland because even though dereliction is rife, there simply isn’t enough derelict land to meet targets. If we want to avoid more sprawl and longer commutes, new greenfield development should be curtailed.

Ireland’s national policy is already aiming for 40 per cent of new housing to be built in existing urban areas. Gardens are already inside the cities. Ireland has hundreds of thousands of square metres of ready-to-go residential land in gardens.

A think tank called Progress Ireland has run some of the numbers to see how many small homes could be built in existing gardens. Obviously gardens without back lanes or side entrances aren’t suitable, and they must be big enough to accommodate a basic studio or one-bedroom modular home. On top of these physical constraints, to be viable building in the garden must be cheaper than renting locally. The report concludes that, across the country, about 18 per cent of existing gardens are suitable. That’s about 348,000 viable sites.

In a crisis, surely it is worth green-lighting such an opportunity. At the very least, planning restrictions should be eased so that neighbours can’t object on the basis of density or views or whatever Nimby nonsense is invented as grounds for objections.

A serious problem for Ireland is that our population isn’t dense enough. We have only 73 people per square kilometre, compared with 279 in the UK. Four times the density means that public infrastructure might be as much as four times more effective. The more we build outwards, the worse our infrastructure will be and the more it will cost.

Speaking of cost, a basic two-bedroom log cabin for a garden is estimated to run about €30,000–€42,000, making it an attractive solution for intergenerational living or as a “starter” home for a young person on family land. Contrast this with the cost of a two-bed apartment in Ireland or a similar starter home on a new estate. This sort of microdevelopment needs to be part of an overall housing plan. It can’t hurt.

I understand many people will regard commandeering back gardens as a gimmick, putting people in a glorified shed or cabin rather than fixing the housing problem permanently. I get it. But anything that reduces pressure on the rental market must be considered for the short term. Having sons and daughters living in their own place beside their parents, or vice versa, might also have dramatic family positives (although it might also have the opposite effect in some cases).

The aim is to reduce the acute pressure. Many younger people might love to live, for a while at least, in the place where they grew up, with a modicum of independence and their own front door. Why should the State, which has failed to provide proper housing, object to this stopgap?

Last year Ireland built only 33,500 houses, a pathetic number. Even if we were to build 50,000 a year, which would be quite an achievement, we are a long way from bringing supply and demand into alignment. On the demand side, migration must be reduced if we are to have any hope of stabilising prices. On the supply side, a Dunkirk emergency strategy must be accepted, however unpalatable to some.