A series of articles appeared in the Sunday papers that highlighted how the government might be changing their attitudes towards which housing markets should get priority.

A story in the Irish Mail on Sunday has indicated that councils and local authorities have been encouraged to stop buying turnkey properties.

Speaking about the top stories in the Sunday papers with The Pat Kenny Show was executive editor of the Independent Kevin Doyle, who explained that the councils competing with young couples and families for these homes could also be pushing up the prices.

He shared: "The nature of the rental market is that certainly for the moment, at least, it's a very profitable industry.

"And the reality is, and I think if you there's maybe a bit of politics in this, because there's another story in the Mail, which gets more heavily into the idea that councils, local authorities have been told to stop buying up turnkey property.

"So a developer comes along, builds a nice three bedroom house somewhere and the buyer turns out to be the council. So the council are competing with what could be young families [and] is pushing up prices generally."

It's not just the councils being told to reign it in as even approved housing authorities are told to cap their building.

The Sunday Independent included a story about how approved housing bodies are being told they've built enough or "This is how many you're allowed to build and no more" in any given year.

Mr Doyle continued: "So approved housing bodies, they get funding from the government and in the last year, they built 4,200 houses.

"They reckon they can get to 5,000 maybe this year and keep going and building more, but a lot of those houses go into things like cost rental schemes, so they are for people who fall within certain income brackets.

"The word coming from the Department of Housing to these bodies is that it's time to plateau, that you need to basically get to 5,000 and that's enough for you. You need to let the private market get involved."

He continued to highlight how these two articles are asking "[Is] the government trying to move back into the space of we need more houses for sale on the private market" and they're less worried about social and affordable housing.

"Could there be politics behind that? Because if you're Fianna Fáil or Fianna Gael, do you want that middle class, young couples, the bank of mum and dad, those type of people to have a better chance of getting housing because you get less of a backlash around social and affordable?"

Main image: Housing in Kinsale, County Cork, Ireland. Pic: Alamy Stock Photo