A number of local families have said they are locked out from applying for a three-bedroom house in an affordable housing development in Co Kildare launched on Thursday, due to a cap on the local authority’s home loan scheme.
The Barracksfield West affordable housing development in Naas was launched on Thursday but some families cannot apply for a three-bed in the scheme as the loan under the Local Authority Affordable Purchase Scheme (LAAPS) is capped at €360,000. This is €5,000 less than the price of the three-bed homes at Barracksfield West.
The first phase of the development, which is located close to the Kildare County Council offices in Naas, will see 66 homes, involving a mix of one-bed apartments, two-bed duplexes and three-bed houses, out of a total of 219 homes, becoming available to purchase.
The homes,built by Andrews Construction, are 24 per cent below the open market value, according to the local authority.
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All of the homes in this initial phase will be made available to eligible buyers through the LAAPS, which is managed jointly by the council and the Land Development Agency (LDA).
Apartments will be available from €243,477, two-bed duplexes from €292,933 and three-bed homes from €365,216.
One person locked out of the scheme is Sandra Rowe, who spoke to The Irish Times earlier this month about her family’s housing predicament.
She and her husband Joe cannot use their own savings to bridge the €5,000 gap to purchase a suitable house for themselves and children, Josh (9) and Ruby (12).
“I’m angry, I’m upset, I’m frightened. Every emotion has gone through me since the prices came out,” Ms Rowe said.
“I’m not asking for them to drop the price [of the homes] ... I am pleading with Minister [for Housing, James] Browne to just higher the threshold,” she added.
Local Independent councillor Bill Clear, who has raised the plight of Ms Rowe’s family and that of other families in a similar situation, was at Thursday’s launch.
“I have a few families who are locked out from applying for a three-bed house. They can’t purchase a house higher than €360,000, they are all local people, their parents, their grandparents, some of them even had great-grandparents who would have been in this barracks. Two families I’m dealing with have had to buy old council houses and do them up, they’ve given up on the system,” he said.
The loan caps under the LAAPS are currently under review by the Minister with results of such a review expected next year.
At the development’s launch on Thursday, Minister for Further and Higher Education James Lawless, a TD for Kildare North, said the housing was built on the site of Devoy Barracks which also was the site of the Army apprenticeship school from 1956 to 1998.
He said that with the launch of Barracksfield West things had come full circle as he said many workers who availed of the current national apprenticeship scheme have worked on the site.
Mr Browne, who also was at the launch, noted it was the first direct delivery of affordable housing by the LDA outside Dublin.
Asked about reports of a shortage of childcare, creche and school places in Naas and the surrounding areas, Mr Browne said the Government was also about building and strengthening communities.
“With homes come other social needs such as creches ... schools and healthcare”. Mr Browne said: “We want to ensure that all the infrastructure, all of the social supports are put in place as quickly as possible ... We are working with our colleagues ... across government to ensure that other facilities come with the homes; for example with Minister [for Education] Norma Foley about how we can ensure creche places are coming along ... both having the facilities ... and also having the creche community there as well.”
LDA chief executive said he felt positive about the body’s ability to provide housing in the future: “We have a really strong pipeline of housing. We are aiming to build 2,000 homes next year and 2,500 to 3,000 the following year,” he said.
The first viewings of Barracksfield West are being held by Lisney Sotheby’s International Realty on Saturday. Applications will be accepted via an online portal which will go live next Wednesday at 10am.
