Dáil Éireann Debate, Tuesday - 28 September 2021
376. Deputy Eoin Ó Broin asked the Minister for Housing, Local Government and Heritage the categories of organisations that will be eligible to apply for the cost rental equity loan and the affordable housing fund (details supplied). [46681/21]
View answerThe implementation of Cost Rental is being supported by the new Cost Rental Equity Loan (CREL) scheme, under which Government loans to Approved Housing Bodies (AHBs) on favourable terms will finance up to 30% of the capital costs of new homes for Cost Rental. CREL was allocated €35m under Budget 2021. The Housing Finance Agency also made available €100m to AHBs in very competitive commercial debt funding, to cover the remaining capital costs of CREL-approved projects in the first tranche. At present, CREL funding is exclusively available to AHBs.
The Affordable Housing Fund (AHF) will provide Exchequer funding support to Local Authorities to assist in the delivery of affordable housing for sale or cost rent, under the provisions of the Affordable Housing Act 2021. Whilst eligibility for the Affordable Housing Fund is specific to local authorities, under Section 6 of the Act, a housing authority may make dwellings available for the purposes of sale to eligible applicants under affordable purchase dwelling arrangements. A housing authority may enter into arrangements with the following bodies for this purpose;
- arrangements with an approved housing body;
- arrangements with a community led organisation, a housing co-operative or a community land trust;
- arrangements with the land development agency; and
- public private partnership arrangements.
As such, the provisions allow local authority led partnership arrangements between housing authorities and these bodies for the provision of homes under the affordable purchase dwelling arrangements.
