Ireland has built a housing system that the country mostly doesn't need, but how can it be fixed?

Housing has been a hot topic of conversation for many years now, with many wondering if the word crisis is appropriate anymore considering how long it's been going on.

Economist Ronan Lyons, author of Brittle: How the Housing Crisis Is Breaking Ireland and How to Fix It, joined Ciara Doherty on The Pat Kenny Show to discuss some of the issues and topics he writes about in his book.

Ciara pointed out how Ireland has "built a system that was based on the family house and 'the semi-D', but that's not exactly what society needs at the moment."

Mr Lyons agreed and explained: "If you ask a politician when they think of housing, you need to think of the stereotypical nurse or guard meeting outside Copper's, going to get married and going to have a family... But that's not what housing need looks like in the 21st century.

"We've got, if you think about, say, 70 years of adult life, you turn 18, hopefully you live to something like 88, and of those, maybe only about 25, 30 years will be in the family home.

"You've got pre-family housing need and post-family housing need and we don't have that. By far and away, we're the most misaligned in Europe in terms of how the housing sits compared to how society sits.

"We need to have a conversation about that and that involves, not just home ownership, but also a healthy social rental sector and a healthy market rental sector.

"Those three pillars are what makes a healthy housing system and we've relied for too long on just one, on the home ownership bit."

Back in 2022, the housing commission came up with an estimate of the housing deficit that was gripping the nation, and it amounted to about 230,000 homes.

In 2026, the numbers of homes missing compared to what is needed has grown to 340,000; that's 100,000 in four years.

Mr Lyons pointed out that unlike most of Europe, our population has grown this century compared to the last, but also that people are living longer, getting married later and having fewer children.

He continued: "All of that means that, even for the same population, we need more homes and different kinds of homes.

"We need a real mindset shift, don't we? We need to have a national conversation and maybe a conversation with ourselves over what housing is and what the housing for a modern economy, a modern Ireland, should look like."

Main image: Dublin city housing Pic: Leah Farrell / © RollingNews.ie