Housing commencements in Cork down 71% last year
In Cork city, there were 560 commencements in December, the most in any month of 2025. Stock image.
Cork housing commencements dropped by 71% from 9,214 in 2024 to 2,687 last year, new Government data has shown.
Data published by the Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage shows there were 1,501 commencements in Cork city last year and 1,186 in Cork county, down significantly from 4,584 and 4,630, respectively, in 2024.
While Cork city’s figure was the second-highest recorded in the last 10 years, the Cork county commencements were the lowest since 2015. Cumulatively, last year saw the
lowest number of commencements in Cork since 2017.
In Cork city, there were 560 commencements in December, the most in any month of 2025, including 464 apartments, 91 scheme houses, and five one-off houses. Overall in 2025, Cork city saw 1,046 apartments, 426 scheme units, and 29 one-off units begin construction.
Cork county had 58 commencements in December — 33 one-off homes, 15 scheme homes, and 10 apartments. There were 445 one-off, 635 scheme, and 106 apartment unit commencement notices issued across 2025.
Nationally, the December result is by far the highest number of new starts in 2025, and the total amount of units commenced in 2025 was 16,412 units, considerably fewer than the 60,000 units the previous year.
Housing minister James Browne said the December figures were very positive.
“We need to ensure we deliver on our ambitions of 300,000 new homes by 2030,” he added.
Of the 3,065 units commenced in December, 979 (32%) are scheme dwellings, 1,820 (59%) are apartments, and 266 (9%) are for one-off units.
In Cork city, 69.7% of new dwellings which commenced were apartments, 28.4% were scheme houses and 1.9% were one-off houses, while in Cork county, scheme houses made up 53.6%, one-off houses 37.5%, and apartments 8.9%.
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