The Total Development Cost Study conducted by the Department of Housing has evaluated the expenses involved in constructing four different types of buildings: a semi-detached house with three bedrooms; a suburban apartment with two bedrooms; an urban apartment also with two bedrooms, and bespoke-built student flats in the Greater Dublin Area.
The study was undertaken by property consultants Mitchell McDermott based in Dublin and makes use of meticulously chosen “anonymised case study projects” from the first three months of 2024. It considers not just land and hard construction costs, but also so-called “soft” costs, these include land, development taxes, professional service fees, VAT and developers’ profit margins.
According to the report, the overall expenditure for delivering a three-bedroom home for a family of five in Dublin stands at €450,652, with hard construction costs accounting for €175,636. The land cost, inclusive of stamp duty and procurement fees, is estimated at €83,943.
The report also found that two-bedroom apartments’ construction costs in Dublin varied, costing €549,790 in suburbs and rising to €591,783 in urban locations. Flats are generally pricier to construct than houses due to the heightened structural necessities such as fire-safety regulations, lifts, and provision for car parks.
In the context of an urban apartment, the report calculated the expenses involved in creating basement car parking at €34,229 for each apartment. The cost of land, including stamp duty and procurement charges, was estimated at €70,703, accounting for 12 percent of the total. Meanwhile, the profit margin for the developer was calculated at €48,605, representing 8.4 percent of the overall cost.
The report also provided insights into the costs for student accommodation, with an average unit costing €207,033 to deliver.