In essence, Zen was happy for the tax-payer to subsidise 25% of the purchase price of the house.
I think it's a bit inaccurate to say the tax payer subsidised 25% of purchase price. I'm not an expert on Part V, but my understanding is developers were obliged to make a certain percentage available for affordable housing. The council didn't hand over 25% of purchase price for each affordable unit. If prices rise the council should make a profit and tax payers benefit?
I would imagine what I paid for my affordable apartment covered the cost price. Nearly 10 years on my apartment is still not worth what I paid for it. I paid €265k and apartments in the area are still only fetching €250k on open market. Private developments are going for more. I just think we need to be careful not to drum up more resentment against those who bought on the scheme. We are taxpayers too and the scheme was available to many working professionals. When properly administered, I think it's a fair scheme.
Although on paper I got approx 30% discount on my property, in reality the discount isn't that much. Developer in our case was let build the affordable units on a separate site. The build and finish were inferior to open market units. Our development isn't gated and has no underground parking or visitor parking as the original development does. Yet our market values are set against those of the privately sold units. Also factor in that there is a huge amount of social units in our development and affordable units fall further in value.
Generalisations around 'tax payers' money can be misleading. I'd love to see a full breakdown of what affordable housing has actually cost the state.
If prices rise the Council will benefit from clawback income, so that's a win surely for taxpayers?