Irish House Prices Climb At Faster Rate In September

(RTTNews) - Ireland's house price inflation accelerated for a sixth straight month in September, figures from the Ireland Central Statistics Office showed Wednesday.

The residential property price index rose 15 percent year-on-year following 14.9 percent increase in August. House prices have been rising since June last year.

In Dublin, the pace of increase eased sightly to 23.4 percent from 25.1 percent. The capital has seen double-digit rise in house prices since August 2013.

Month-on-month, house prices increased 1.8 percent in September after rising 2.3 percent in August. Dublin house prices climbed 2.5 percent following 3.5 percent increase in the previous month.

"There appears to be no let up in the recovery in the Irish housing market," Alan McQuaid, an economist at Merrion Stockbrokers in Dublin, said.

"However, the new lending restrictions imposed by the Central Bank are likely to weigh negatively on first-time buyers from the start of next year and should help to push down house price growth in 2015."

That said, McQuaid expects the generally improving economic backdrop to help sustain the house price recovery in the short-term even with credit restrictions.