Is the issue paperwork? Attention and will? Money? The department?
The old three-storey corner building at 19 Buckingham Street Lower in the north inner-city, is boarded up, the brickwork stained and faded.
It’s owned these days by the council.
And, in December, a council official told Green Party Councillor Janet Horner that they are teasing out what to do with it and will provide an update soon, she said.
The property falls under the purview of the Development Department, rather than the council’s Housing and Community Services Department, said Ruth Dowling, an executive council manager, by email.
Dublin City Council has been the registered owner of 19 Buckingham Street Lower for 11 years, since September 2014, show property records. But council officials told Horner by email that the council only owns the leasehold for the property, not the freehold.
The council has not yet responded to queries as to why it didn’t buy the freehold, when it first bought the house.
It is not clear if that is the reason the council hasn’t developed it – or if it just hasn’t come up with a plan or the money for it.
Estate agent Ben Thompson said that it’s common for owners in Dublin to find they don’t own the freehold. But that can be resolved since the owner has a legal right to buy out the freehold title for a small sum or extend the lease, he said.
The council has tried to do that but hasn’t yet succeeded, said a spokesperson for Dublin City Council by email. “The Council has not applied to land registry for arbitration purposes.”
“Given the time that has passed since there was an attempt to acquire the property by agreement, the City Valuer has been requested to re-engage with the owners with a view to acquisition by agreement before considering the commencement of any proceedings under the CPO Process,” they said.
The convoluted process and timeframes though – alongside news that funding constraints have blocked work to do up acquired properties elsewhere, and buying any more – has again fired up criticisms among councillors as to how the council regenerates vacant buildings it owns.
So many properties sit stuck after the council buys them, they say, and they’re not done up and filled again with residents, community spaces, or whatever is settled on, quickly enough.
At 41 Parnell Square East, Dublin City Council has been locked in a legal battle with a former owner for decades, following a legal challenge to a compulsory purchase of a historic building in 1998. Meanwhile, the building sits vacant.
“These examples show the failings of the current system,” says Horner. “We need a much more streamlined process for vacant and derelict properties that ensures the council can bring them back into use more quickly.”
A spokesperson for the Department of Housing said: “The CPO Activation Programme encourages a proactive and systematic approach by local authorities to address vacancy and dereliction.”
That programme aims to encourage councils to use existing powers to compulsorily purchase homes where necessary and the department tracks their progress.
But they didn’t outline any plans to modernise, streamline or update the CPO legislation or provide more funding to regenerate properties after they are bought by councils.
As of September 2019, Dublin City Council was carrying out “preliminary works” in relation to 19 Buckingham Street Lower, said a report to councillors.
As of January 2022, it flagged issues with “Partial title, CPO necessary to regularise”, said another report.
Horner, the Green Party councillor, says it’s difficult to know if the title issue is behind the council’s failure to develop the property.
Council projects often slip through the cracks when the person in charge leaves their job or moves to another section, she says. “There is a lack of oversight and management.”
Thompson, sales and marketing director with Churches Estate Agents, says that many properties in Dublin city are owned under leasehold arrangements, often dating back to aristocratic land ownership systems of the 1800s.
He has acted for property owners in Dublin where the freehold land owner was the Earl of Pembroke. “This is a very common occurrence,” says Thompson.
Leasehold ownership can prevent an owner from developing their property, he says, because sometimes they can’t do major construction works without the freehold owner’s permission.
As the leasehold enters the last 50 years, banks might be reluctant to accept it as security for a mortgage, says Thompson. “The legal advice would probably be to regularise it.”
That is fairly easy to do, says Thompson, because the leasehold owner has a legal right to buy out the freehold ownership or extend the lease for another long period of time.
The cost the freehold owner can charge is minimal, he says, but the owner might have to pay solicitors' fees to get the paperwork in order.
In October 2025, Dublin City Council said it was taking a new, zero tolerance, approach to dereliction – but also said that funding had been paused for buying derelict houses.
A spokesperson for the Department of Housing said that funding is available to councils to buy vacant and derelict sites under the Social Housing Investment Programme to use as social housing,” he says.
“Funding is also available through Call 3 of the Urban Regeneration and Development Fund for local authorities to acquire vacant and derelict properties for resale on the open market,” said the spokesperson.
If the council wants to regenerate the site once it has it, though, it needs to find funding for that.
In her email to Horner, Dowling said that work had been “paused” on two derelict properties at 19 and 21 Connaught Street in Phibsboro, because of issues around funding.
The properties were first listed on the derelict sites register in 2009. Dublin City Council CPOed them and has owned them since 2019.
Dowling, the council manager, said in the email that, council staff “had just stabilised the properties in early 2025 and were ready to go out to tender when the project was paused”.
“They will apply to the Department with the estimated cost to finish the works but approval rests with the Department,” she said. “If no funding is available alternatives including selling the properties may need to be considered.”
Councillors on the council’s urban redevelopment working group have been pushing the council to pursue CPOs more vigorously. They have agreed they would prefer not to sell off sites, but to try to develop them for social or cost rental homes, to address the affordable housing shortage.
Lois Kapila
In October, Fine Gael Councillor Danny Byrne said that sometimes the Department of Housing initially says it will fund the council to refurbish a derelict property to use as social housing but then backtracks.
“In some cases, it is the Department of Housing’s fault,” says Byrne.
But if the department doesn’t fund the council to renovate the home for social housing, the council should sell it quickly, so that someone can live there, he says.
Horner says that it is possible the CPO process needs to be streamlined and that the council needs a clearer process, and a clearer funding stream to regenerate the homes. Regardless of where the blocks lie, they need to be ironed out she says.
Given the current housing crisis, the compulsory purchase process needs to work fast and effectively to bring homes back into use, she says. “This needs to be tackled as a priority.”
A spokesperson for the Department of Housing says that its CPO Activation Programme “encourages a proactive and systematic approach by local authorities to address vacancy and dereliction”.
The goal is to get the home back into use, either as social housing, community use or sold on the private market, they said.
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