Dublin estate agents expect new instructions to be down by 50 per cent as would-be sellers sit tight

ESTATE AGENT Denis Beare generally works right through the month of August, taking instructions to sell and assembling brochures before the autumn selling season kicks off at the end of the month.

However, this year Beare, a divisional director of Lisney, says that there is little ground work to be done. Potential sellers are postponing their plans until the market improves, with some prepared to sit tight for a year or more if that's what it takes.

It's a message that estate agents are getting across Dublin, with new instructions expected to drop by as much as 50 per cent this autumn.

At Sherry FitzGerald, the country's largest estate agency chain, director Simon Ensor says that, judging by the number of instructions so far, it is shaping up to be a quiet September. "We are not getting as many calls from sellers and when we do get called, and they hear our valuations, they are deciding to stay put.

"I can think of several houses that could come onto the market, but won't because the owners can't cope with the kind of prices we're putting on them."

In Terenure, Pat Mullery, a director of Douglas Newman Good, agrees that new instructions could be down by around 50 per cent, though he sees it as a positive. "If the supply drops, it will help us to get through the exisiting stock."

Mullery estimates that his branch is carrying three times the amount of stock compared to three years ago when the market was reaching its peak.

Supply is at an all-time high across the city, with agencies dealing with an overhang of unsold properties, some of which have been for sale for over a year.

Property website Myhome.ie has 8,394 homes listed for sale in the Dublin area, twice as many as were for sale at the peak of the market in autumn 2006.

Wade Wise, residential director at Savills HOK, says that supply is significantly down. "The only people who are selling now need to sell for genuine reasons. The speculative seller is out of the picture."

New on Pat Mullery's books are executor sales, houses being sold by people who are emigrating, and properties that have been repossessed.

Across the city in Howth, Joe Kelly of Property Team JB Kelly has over 90 properties in his shopwindow, twice as many as in recent years. And they are taking longer to sell.

While some transactions are happening in the mid market - from €500,000 to €1 million - he says that the €1.5 million-plus sale is virtually extinct.

The trade down market has also frozen, says Kelly, since downsizers have little confidence in selling their own home.

"People have taken a double hit, with the value of the home well down and their shares also devalued.

"The traditional downsizer who wanted to sell in order to put money in a pension fund and to give the kids €50,000 each has just gone."

Speculative builders are also history, says Kelly, which has depressed affluent areas. "The house that had been worth €2.7 million to a builder because it had a site in the garden is now worth about €1.4 million because the builder is no longer competing."

Apartments are proving particuarly difficult to sell across the city, according to one city centre agent who says, it is "virtually impossible" to sell a city centre flat unless it has a balcony and a car parking space.

Grim economic forecasts all summer have at least had one effect, says Mullery. "I would have said most vendors know exactly what is going on, and they know what we are going to say. Most are prepared to be realistic."

Back at Lisney, significant price cuts are happening. In Enniskerry, for instance, a large four-bedroom house in the Eagle Valley development has just been reduced by €200,000 to €1.7 million.

It all comes down to price, says Mullery. "If you are expecting to get a sale in September, you need to have it priced accurately, and realistically. Then you have a decent chance of getting it away."