PropertyPal CEO: ‘Time to move into a solutions space’

Visiting PropertyPal’s headquarters in the grounds of the Jennymount Mill complex in north Belfast, Ciarán Galway speaks with CEO Jordan Buchanan about prevailing residential property trends in Northern Ireland, optimism, and ambition.

A familiar feature of Belfast’s cityscape, the 19th century Jennymount linen mill – a creation of John Lanyon – is an understated home for Northern Ireland’s most prominent property website. From this subtle base tucked in a corner of the mill’s footprint, PropertyPal has become the leading player in the residential property landscape. In fact, one-sixth of adults in Northern Ireland visit its website each day.

A former Ulster Business School economics lecturer, Buchanan was appointed as PropertyPal CEO in January 2024, having previously served as the company’s Chief Operating Officer and Chief Economist.

Describing PropertyPal as “the advertising platform for properties – whether residential or commercial – in the Northern Ireland marketplace”, the CEO succinctly summarises: “We aim to be the go-to source for information relating to property.”

“If we take 1990 as a 35-year horizon, house prices – once adjusted for inflation – have increased by 146 per cent. Meanwhile, incomes have increased by 27 per cent…” Jordan Buchanan, CEO, PropertyPal

In recent years, the company has diversified its suite of datapoints in what Buchanan describes as an effort to “to innovate our product” and “empower potential purchasers and homebuyers with enhanced transparency”.

Residential property trends

Contextualising the current housing market in Northern Ireland, Buchanan begins in the immediate post-Thatcher era. “One of the major megatrends since then has been a considerable growth in house prices at a much faster rate than income growth,” he says.

“If we take 1990 as a 35-year horizon, house prices – once adjusted for inflation – have increased by 146 per cent. Meanwhile, incomes have increased by 27 per cent in the same timeframe. That gap between the two is a major structural economic change that has led to the financialisation of housing, defining the role that lenders play, ultimately, in enabling people to access housing.”

More recently, the Covid-19 pandemic was an inflection point for the housing market in Northern Ireland. Amid a hugely uncertain economic outlook, there was widespread speculation that the market would suddenly collapse.

Instead, the opposite happened. “It puzzled everyone at the time,” the PropertyPal CEO recalls. “With the benefit of hindsight, we can understand the dynamics that were at play. Typically, the people transacting in the residential sales market tend to be mid to high earners. This is the same cohort of people who were able to save a significant amount of money during the pandemic and their priorities pivoted towards purchasing property.”

As such, housing demand spiked and over the subsequent years, the northern market experienced demand which massively outstripped supply both in terms of second hand and new build properties.

Ultimately, this led to a net reduction in the number of properties for sale which compounded the unrelenting demand. Put simply, more people were competing for fewer properties, inevitably leading to house price inflation.

Simultaneously, inflation emerged as the predominant economic challenge of the last five years. “In this time,” Buchanan notes, “inflation has been 25 per cent while wages have grown by 21 per cent. So, once again, we have seen wages falling relative to inflation”.

“Meanwhile, house prices have increased by 32 per cent. In real terms, house price growth has been 6 per cent. Likewise, rental market prices have increased by 46 per cent, or a more concerning 16 per cent increase relative to inflation.”

Describing exceptionally high demand in the rental market as the “major challenge facing the Northern Ireland residential property market”, the PropertyPal CEO observes: “Allied to the structural supply side pressures, this challenge is compounding annually.”

Housing crisis

Whether or not Northern Ireland is now experiencing a housing crisis is a question of subjectivity, though Buchanan outlines: “I do not disagree with the sentiment that we are at least walking towards a housing crisis.”

“We are very much at a point in terms of market dynamics whereby we have a growing pressure in the housing system, an underserviced and growing demand for the private rental market, a social housing waiting list which is expanding year-on-year, and a growing homelessness problem,” he summarises, rationalising his own position.

“I do not disagree with the sentiment that we are at least walking towards a housing crisis.”

Supply

Crucially, with major challenges across the entire housing system, it is glaringly apparent that an inadequate number of new homes are being delivered each year. In fact, in 2023, housebuilding reached a 65-year low in Northern Ireland.

When discussing potential solutions to the prevailing and compounding problems in the housing system, Buchanan warns against demand side proposals which he regards as “tinkering with the wrong problem”.

“The root cause is that we do not have enough supply. We have the benefit of looking at other jurisdictions, including literally down the road [in the Republic] where they were not prepared to deal with this challenge and now there absolutely is a housing crisis,” he says.

Residential construction

In this context, the residential construction sector is facing a conundrum in that while it has the capacity to build more homes, it cannot do so due to the well documented inadequacy of Northern Ireland’s wastewater infrastructure. In fact, in 2024, in the absence of connection to wastewater services, a total of 19,000 homes with planning approval across 23 towns could not be built.

Tracing this challenge, PropertyPal figures indicate that, between 2015 and 2019, the website typically advertised in the region of between 4,000 and 4,500 new build homes each year. In recent years, reflecting the slowdown in construction and residential development, that figure has fallen to between 2,000 and 2,500.

“We did not invest in wastewater infrastructure when we needed to invest and now the economy is paying the price with investment stalling in the Northern Ireland market,” Buchanan observes.

Infrastructure investment

Contending that “industry understands this problem very well”, the PropertyPal CEO is adamant that “now is the time to move into a solutions space regarding the house-building challenge”.

“Quite simply, the solution is funding. Residential construction is unlocked through additional funding for NI Water to invest in the long-term capacity of wastewater infrastructure.

“I do not understand any scenario that does not lead to NI Water accessing private finance. There are obvious pros and cons, but the real challenge right now is decisions not being taken and the impact that this has on the economy today and for years to come,” he insists.

Expressing sympathy with the challenge facing NI Water, Buchanan argues that there must be “a significant change in funding policy taken by the Executive” given the competing demands in a constrained budgetary context.

“While there is merit in having mature discussions about revenue raising opportunities, including water charges and developer contributions, the financial potential is nowhere near the level of investment that is required. Being brave is the important dynamic. These decisions require strong political representatives to stand up and talk about challenges beyond election cycles,” he advocates.

First-time buyers

Today, the average age of a first-time buyer in Northern Ireland is 33 and a typical first-time buyer home costs around £180,000.

“First-time buyers are saving throughout their 20s and into their early 30s. However, when we have a scenario in which wages are falling relative to inflation and much of this cohort is locked into the private rented sector where it is spending 35 per cent or more of its income on rent, the ability to save a £20,000 deposit becomes increasingly difficult,” Buchanan outlines.

As a consequence, first-time buyers are increasingly reliant on parental support and/or accessing low deposit mortgage finance. In fact, the data indicates that more than half of all first-time buyers receive parental support via deposit contributions and this figure is growing year-on-year.

“The result is a shift towards a scenario in which first-time buyers will have a great chance of accessing homeownership if their parents were homeowners and benefited from house price appreciation over recent decades,” the PropertyPal CEO explains, reasoning: “The philosophical question, therefore, is this the economic model we want to operate within?”

Private rented sector

Given the barriers faced by first-time buyers, would-be purchasers are renting for longer – often contrary to their household requirements – and delaying major life decisions. Consequently, demand in the private rented sector has experienced exponential growth.

In the last two years, private rented sector demand has been extreme. For example, in 2024, every property listed for rent on PropertyPal would have had an average of 70 enquires sent to the estate agent after being listed for one day or even less.

“At the minute, the private rented sector is not futureproofed to deal with increasing demand,” Buchanan indicates. “The metrics are going in the wrong direction, and the pressures are compounding. We are absolutely moving towards a model in which more and more people are going to be limited in their access to homeownership which will continue to place pressure on the private rented sector.”

Mortgage trends

Meanwhile, in the post-Covid era, a combination of rising house prices, the Liz Truss ‘experiment’, and a subsequent surge in interest rates, has placed a compounding pressure on homeowners. The result was a significant increase in mortgage repayments.

According to PropertyPal’s latest index, however, mortgage rates are beginning to settle amid interest rate reductions in August and November 2024, and February 2025. “Forward guidance is indicating that there will be one or two more interest rates cuts in 2025, and lenders are beginning to price that in,” Buchanan explains. “There is a lot more competition in the lending market. The recently announced trade policies from President Trump add more economic uncertainty into the mix and the outlook for interest rates is less certain than the start of the year.”

However, one ominous trend identified by the PropertyPal CEO is a transition to lengthier mortgage terms. In 2007, for example, around 20 per cent of first-time buyers took a mortgage term of 30 years. By 2024, this figure had increased to over 50 per cent.

“Again we are seeing this structural trend whereby affordability pressures require households to borrow more money to purchase a home. The problem is that if they borrow more money, because of the affordability stress test that lenders apply, they may also extend the mortgage terms to keep repayments at a sustainable level.

“If you look at any of the mortgage sourcing tables, there are more products being offered with 35-year and 40-year terms. If this structural change continues to compound, these product terms will become increasingly common, and the endpoint could be intergenerational mortgages.”

Optimism

While prevailing economic uncertainty, including projections for very low growth, is the greatest headwind facing the Northern Ireland housing market, Buchanan remains optimistic about the resilience of the Northern Ireland economy.

Tracing the “copious economic volatility” over the last decade, he believes that “the one silver lining” in Northern Ireland over recent years has been a buoyant labour market. “If a region this size can keep people in work and paid relatively well, we will be okay,” he says. “Despite policy challenges already mentioned, the labour market has been the shining light for the region, driven from both domestic resourcing and inward investment opportunities.”

Highlighting the UK Measures of National Wellbeing published by the Office of National Statistics in February 2025, Buchanan points to the fact that Northern Ireland has consistently topped the list of happiest regions. “We have a cultural DNA which means we just get on with things. You cannot put a price on that from an economic perspective,” he quips.

Ambition

Outlining PropertyPal’s ambition for the next five years, Buchanan is candid. “Growth,” he smiles, concluding: “We are very proud to have an embedded presence in Northern Ireland. With the merger with Propertynews in 2024, there is a lot of internal work at the minute to improve the quality of our platforms, looking to partner with other organisations to improve the depth of information and data they have, and continuing to invest in the Northern Ireland marketplace.

“We are very proud to have world class portal operating out of small office in north Belfast. We are surrounded by behemoths, and we are proud to be paddling our own canoe, offering a very high standard of service to the people of Northern Ireland.”