The truly sad story of a west Mayo pyrite estate
by Dr. Richard Martin
I’ve been working in the construction industry this summer with Chris Moran.
Recently, I’ve been working on the retrofit of the garda station in Achill, but earlier this summer I spent a lot of time in the two houses Chris Moran is building in the Páirc na Coille housing estate in Westport.
The housing estate is a pyrite estate built with defective blocks. The houses are essentially worthless and have to be demolished.
It’s something that’s been on my mind all summer as I’ve drove to and from the estate delivering and collecting.
The bottom line is: It’s not fair. The stress and anxiety must be unbearable for those affected.
I rang Councillor Peter Flynn and asked him if he’d like to meet and chat and we agreed to meet.
He invited me over to his beautiful modern house with breath-taking views of Croagh Patrick the following Saturday morning and offered inferior coffee and superior bread. Supping and munching we kicked off.
RM: Tell me about Páirc na Coille.
PF: Look Páirc na Coille is very much a story of two halves. Back in the town council days of 2000, when we decided to pursue affordable houses in Westport, it was at the time the Celtic Tiger was roaring on when house prices, very similar to today, were out of control, where people in, I suppose, middle-income jobs simply couldn't afford to buy a house in Westport.
Westport Town Council was one of the first councils in Ireland to undertake an affordable housing scheme.
So we worked with a housing body called Respond and we developed plans to build 54 houses, a mix of two-, three- and four-bedroom houses. The work kicked off in around 2001/2002, and the estate would have been completed sometime towards the end of 2002 or early 2003. All of the homes were subsequently allocated.
People moved into the estate in August 2003. You knew everybody who was in there. There were young families, young couples, a few younger people. Part of the deal was that there was a 20-year clawback on it, and this is a really important point.
So if you sold your house within the 20-year period, there was a clawback on any profit that you made, with Mayo County Council enjoying the share of that.
RM: Did the people who moved into the estate actually buy their houses?
PF: They did.
RM: Initially?
PF: Yeah, so they bought the house off Mayo County Council. Mayo County Council signed off on the estate because Respond pulled out a few months before the end of the project.
RM: And were all the houses a fixed price?
PF: They were, depending on the size. There was two-, three- and four-bedroom houses, so each of them had individual prices.
RM: And did the people have to go to the bank for a mortgage?
PF: No. This is a really important point.
The deal was that people had to have their mortgage with Mayo County Council. They also had to show that they had the house insured every year. They also had a charge on the property that any sale would be subject to approval from Mayo County Council.
RM: How long were the mortgages?
PF: They were 25 year mortgages. So most of the people should have been coming out with their mortgages in probably about three years’ time.
But, unfortunately, now most of them are back into a situation whereby they need a top-up mortgage in the region of a €100,000 plus to rebuild their houses.
Mayo County Council, in fairness to them, could never have foreseen what was going to happen in terms of pyrite.
Back in 2017, we had an issue with the community building in Páirc na Coille, which was built as part of the estate at the time.
So that's when it first came to a head. That's when we first noticed structural damage within the building and in a house very close by.
I wasn't on the county council in 2017, but my understanding was that officials within Mayo County Council were aware that there was a potential issue with pyrite in Páirc na Coille.
RM: From that moment, when pyrite was strongly suspected, there was a huge red flag. What do you think should have happened?
PF: Well, I think the first thing that Mayo County Council should have done is written a letter to all of the residents and said, look, we have identified issues in the community building. One of the homeowners has come to us with a potential problem as well.
We don't know if it's related/linked. We don't know if there's other situations, but we're going to go off and do a test on them. Would you be happy to be part of that test? And I think most people, while they would have been really mad and really worried about it all, it would have at least given them the full picture as to what the potential issue could be.
I think far more damage is done by just saying nothing.
RM: Absolutely.
PF: Well, I mean, you know the outcome of burying the head in the sand scenario, and that's exactly what has happened here.
RM: All the people living there still paying off their mortgages?
PF: Yes. But some of the houses were sold on the market. The last two houses were sold in 2021 and 2020.
RM: How much?
PF: Both of those were just under €300,000. In effect, they were worth probably about €40-50,000 because they had to be demolished.
It was after the last sale was in 2021 that the news started filtering out.
RM: When did Mayo County Council officially acknowledge that this is a pyrite estate?
PF: They've never acknowledged it. They have never, ever made official communication. There's been never official communication with any of the tenants, as far as I'm aware.
Mayo County Council was effectively saying 'these are privately owned houses, we have nothing to do with it'. When, in fact, all of the original tenants still have their mortgages with the county council. All of the original tenants still have a charge on their house.
All of the original tenants still have the clawback piece in situ. So for Mayo County Council to claim that there is no relationship between the tenants and themselves is, in my view, completely inaccurate and legally incorrect. They council have to have some culpability in the matter.
RM: I mean, if they built these houses, they can't just very well turn around and say, that's nothing to do with us.
PF: Well, that's pretty much what they have done. We've had numerous meetings.
We had a special meeting on it. And I mean, the council has pretty much washed its hands of it. They have done nothing.
They're saying they have no responsibility, that this is a private estate, that Mayo County Council has no relationship. Even though all the mortgages and all the legal documents are wholly tied up with Mayo County Council.
RM: Has the council a moral responsibility?
PF: Well, more than a moral responsibility, in my view, they have a legal responsibility as well to the tenants. And keep in mind, the number of tenants that would have maybe put an extension onto their house between 2017 and 2022.
The number of tenants that would have retrofitted their houses. The number of tenants that might have put in new kitchens, new doors, new whatever. All the money that was spent.
I mean, those people were oblivious to what was potentially going on behind the scenes. A fortune could have been spent after 2017, I'd say.
RM: Who pays for the rebuild? How does it work?
PF: Right now, people in Páirc na Coille are getting between roughly about €140,000 to I'm guessing around €230,000 in grant assistance through the pyrite scheme. So anyone who I know that has engaged in the process, they're coming away with a mortgage of around €100,000 plus to rebuild their houses.
The scheme does not come up to the number that is required. They don't even come close. So everybody is out of pocket that's rebuilding their house down there.
Everyone's out of pocket. And the piece that people forget about is this is a really difficult estate. It's built on the side of a hill where the government scheme only covers above the foundation but ignores the fact that there could be as many blocks underneath the building as the building itself.
They ignore the fact that they're all on the slope and it's a really, really difficult building itself. And that part has really hurt people because it's costing people €20/30/40,000 just to get it back up to foundation level again, because of the pyrite issue below the surface as well as above the surface.
Supposing, for example, I bought the house there in 2003 for €250,000 and have been living there ever since.
Then I discover the pyrite problem. I say, well, OK, I'll knock it down and rebuild. Then, obviously, I can't live there.
So I have to move out. Now it's very difficult if you have a family to find somewhere to live with the rental accommodation.
RM: Do you get rental money?
PF: Yes, so you get €15,000 of accommodation costs covered.
RM: €15,000 isn't a lot.
PF: Well, if you take Westport as an example, where you can't get anything for a family under €2,000, that's just over seven months covered. And, I mean, no one has been rebuilding their house in seven months. It is taking more like 12 to 15 months.
One family had to move to County Galway to find accommodation and they had to commute back into Westport every day for school and for work.
So many people are finding themselves in that situation.
RM: Are the residents in Páirc na Coille still making their mortgage repayments to Mayo County Council?
PF: This is the ironic part.
The residents down there who had their existing mortgages with Mayo County Council went to Mayo County Council to see could they extend their mortgages to get the extra money, the top-up money they needed, the €100,000-plus, but Mayo County Council refused.
So all of these people had to go to AIB and Bank of Ireland.
And, in fairness to the banks, they have stepped up to the mark.
What they did is paid off Mayo County Council's piece of the mortgage and took the full mortgage.
They're still repaying and they cannot get insurance. Could they turn around and not pay the mortgage? What would happen then? That's a good question.
It's a crazy situation that the council washed their hands of it.
Yet one of the terms and conditions when they took on the mortgage with Mayo County Council was that they had to produce insurance every year to ensure that the house is insured.
However, those houses are uninsurable at the moment because of the pyrite situation. So people are living there with no insurance.
Mayo County Council is aware that they have no insurance, and yet they're continuing to take the mortgage payments off people who are in pyrite houses every month of the year.
And they're not willing to accept any accountability. That's wrong.
....
Mistakes happen. No-one foresaw the pyrite defective blocks. But it is the duty of the organs of the State to act as a safety net for the vulnerable in our society.
The residents in Páirc na Coille have been left high and dry.
Instead, they should be reimbursed in full by the State.
Not a penny more. Not a penny less.