Monaghan County Council and housing bodies working in the county will no longer be able to buy newly built homes off developers for social housing once a Government cut-off date passes at the end of next year. Housing Minister James Browne announced on Tuesday 20 October that turnkey acquisitions are to be phased out, with the emphasis moving to homes that councils and approved housing bodies build themselves.
Under the change, the final date for sending turnkey funding applications to the Department of Housing will be 31 December 2027. After that, no new turnkey proposals will be accepted for approval. The Department said the time gap is there to give local authorities and approved housing bodies (AHBs) time to "recalibrate".
What a turnkey deal is
A turnkey acquisition is where a council or AHB agrees to buy social homes after they have been built, or after construction has already started. Because the scheme is already under way when it is offered for sale, the council has no say in what type of homes are delivered. The Department's own explanation is blunt: the homes would have been built anyway, so the State's purchase does not add to the overall number of homes being built.
Minister Browne said the move was a commitment in the Programme for Government and the new housing plan, Delivering Homes, Building Communities. He said it would "cease the reliance on the acquisition of homes that would otherwise have been available to the private market" and let the State influence "the design, specification and mix of homes from the outset".
What replaces it
Future social housing will come increasingly from council and AHB own-build programmes and from partnership deals with developers and the Land Development Agency. Under a partnership development agreement, the council sets out the type and number of homes it needs and invites developers to deliver them. The same kind of agreement can be used where a scheme already has planning permission but has stalled, with the council agreeing to buy the finished homes so the builder can proceed.
A Social Housing Circular setting out the transition rules is due to issue shortly. Projects approved before the cut-off will be allowed to finish, so the Department expects homes from the existing turnkey pipeline to keep arriving through 2027, 2028 and in some cases 2029, tapering off over time.
Where Monaghan stands
Monaghan County Council already leans heavily on building its own homes. In its Housing Focus update, the council said it was on track to deliver 97 new social and affordable homes across the county in 2026, with 58 under construction on several sites. Combined with acquisitions and leasing, it expects to add 102 homes to its stock by the end of the year.
The council delivered 113 additional homes in 2025, more than 80% above its Government target. Its two big council-owned sites in Monaghan town are at Latlorcan, with 51 homes, and Mullaghmatt, with 21, both being built by GEDA Construction. Ten affordable purchase homes are also being built in Carrickmacross.
Director of Housing Olga McConnon said that over the Housing for All plan from 2021 to 2025 the council built 529 homes, acquired 74 and leased 79 for social housing, giving homes to 682 individuals and families. Those figures show buying was a small part of the mix next to building, though the council's numbers do not split out how many of the acquisitions were turnkey deals.
The council has not yet commented publicly on how the change will affect its plans from 2028 on.
