Central Statistics Office

Prices division

Central Statistics Office, Skehard Road, Cork, T12 X00E, Ireland

The OOHPI provides comparable measures for changes in prices paid by households for the acquisition of dwellings that are new to the household sector and changes in other costs related to the ownership and transfer of ownership of dwellings. It is compiled using the ‘net acquisitions’ approach and uses annually chain-linked Laspeyres method to calculate aggregate indices.

The OOHPI is broken down into the following expenditure categories:

• O.1. Owner-occupiers’ housing expenditure;
  • O.1.1. Acquisitions of dwellings;
    • O.1.1.1. New dwellings;
      • O.1.1.1.1. Purchases of newly built dwellings;
      • O.1.1.1.2. Self-built dwellings and major renovations;
    • O.1.1.2. Existing dwellings new to households;
    • O.1.1.3. Other services related to the acquisition of dwellings;
  • O.1.2. Ownership of dwellings;
    • O.1.2.1. Major repairs and maintenance;
    • O.1.2.2. Insurance connected with dwellings;
    • O.1.2.3. Other services related to ownership of dwellings.

Households who are owner occupiers of their dwellings.

The main statistical variables are price indices and their aggregates reflecting changes in prices of the products and services acquired by the households to purchase, service and maintain residential dwellings owned and occupied by them. The elementary indices are produced by other statistical areas, e.g. HPI, CPI, WPI, and provided in their final form. Intermediate aggregates are calculated using annually chain-linked Laspeyres method. 

Purchases of residential property and of other products and services related to property ownership by households at market prices.

Not applicable

Republic of Ireland.

Quarterly OOH series are available from Q1 2010 to present.

2015=100

Index at Base 2015 = 100.

Calendar quarter

OOHPI is produced under the REGULATION (EU) 2016/792 OF THE EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT AND OF THE COUNCIL of 11 May 2016 on harmonised indices of consumer prices and the house price index.

There are no national legal acts specific to the OOHPI, it is compiled under the general Statistics Act, 1993.

None

Price indices do not present any danger of statistical disclosure of confidential information, as they contain none.

Not applicable

Data are provided to Eurostat not later than at T+85 days after the end of the reference quarter. There is no national publication.

Check Eurostat website

Indices are published via the Eurostat database.

Quarterly.

Managed by Eurostat

Eurostat database

Eurostat database

None

None

There are no methodological documents specific to the OOHPI at the national level. Compilation process follows the general guidelines set in the "Technical Manual on Owner-Occupied Housing and House Price Indices" produced by Eurostat and available from the Eurostat website.

Numerous methodological documents, describing data sources, calculation methods etc., are available for the areas providing the elementary indices on the CSO's website.

No other documentation, specific to OOHPI is available.

OOHPI, like any statistical product in the CSO Ireland, is produced and certified within the frames of the Quality Management Framework (QMF).

See description of QMF in these documents: https://www.cso.ie/en/media/csoie/methods/quality/CSO_Quality_Strategy_2020-2023.pdf and https://www.cso.ie/en/methods/quality/qualitymanagementframework/

OOHPI methodology was revised in 2020 and is considered to be fully fit for purpose.

OOHPI fully responds to the needs formulated in the Regulation (EU) 2016/792

The publication of the OOHPI and user support are managed by the Eurostat.

OOHPI covers all statistics required by the relevant paragraphs of the Regulation (EU) 2023/1470 

As the underlying elementary indices are sourced in their final form from other statistical areas, it is difficult to estimate their accuracy or that of the aggregate indices.

As the underlying elementary indices are sourced in their final form from other statistical areas, it is difficult to estimate the sampling error involved in their production.

As the underlying elementary indices are sourced in their final form from other statistical areas, it is difficult to estimate the non-sampling error involved in their production.

OOHPI is not published nationally. The results are transmitted to the Eurostat before T+85 days after the end of the reference quarter. 

OOHPI is typically delivered to Eurostat 30 days ahead of the target deadline (T+85 days from the end of reference quarter)

Not applicable. OOHPI is calculated for the whole of the Republic of Ireland only.

The results are fully comparable from Q1 2010 to present.

Elementary indices provided by other statistical areas are based on the published data. A full coherence is expected with CPI and PPI, where appropriate.

The sub-indices are calculated by annually chain-linked Laspeyres method from the elementary aggregates. Therefore, the results are fully coherent.

Direct costs of production of OOHPI are minimal as all data are sourced from other statistical areas. Transfer of the data, aggregation and preparing the outputs for transmission requires approximately 3 days of work by one qualified statistician per quarter.

There is no additional response burden, as all the data used were collected already for other purposes.

One quarter of OOHPI is revised every time to account for the property transactions executed and filed in different quarters and the resulting change in HPI. The latest published quarterly data is, then, always preliminary.

Weights for the year Y-1 and all 4 quarters of the correspondng indices are revised once in Q1 of the year Y to account for revisions of the weights supplied by the National Accounts.

Full series of OOHPI were revised in 2020 due to changes in the underlying methodology and again in 2022 to implement price-updating of the weights to Q4 of the year Y-1, as per Regulation 2016/792.

No more revisions, apart from the regular updates of the latest data, are planned in the near future.

 See below.

Elementary indices are provided in their final form by the CPI, PPI and HPI, except for the stamp duty sub-index, which is based on stamp duty returns to the Revenue Commissioners 

Weights are provided by the National Accounts division or calculated from the stamp duty data compiled by the Revenue Commissioners and obtained by the CSO under Statistics Act, 1993.

Monthly, except for the National Accounts data, which is collected annually.

Electronically, via internal data sharing with other CSO sections and secure transfer from the Revenue to the CSO's Administrative Data Center.

Elementary indices and weights are based on the data validated and published by other statistical areas and require no further validation.

See below.

See below.

OOHPI is a Laspeyres-type price index.

At the first stage:

- elementary aggregates O.1.1.3 and O.1.2.3 are calculated as described in p. 18.5.4;

- sub-index O.1.1.1 is calculated by aggregating O.1.1.1.1 and O.1.1.1.2 via annually chain-linked Laspeyres method.

At the second stage:

- sub-index O.1.1 is calculated by aggregating O.1.1.1,  O.1.1.2 and O.1.1.3 via annually chain-linked Laspeyres method;

- sub-index O.1.2 is calculated by aggregating O.1.2.1, O.1.2.2 and O.1.2.3 via annually chain-linked Laspeyres method.

Finally, the OOHPI (O.1) is calculated by aggregating O.1.1 and O.1.2 via annually chain-linked Laspeyres method.

All weights for the year Y are based on National Accounts data, except for O.1.1.1.1 and O.1.1.2, which are derived directly from the data on the sales of residential dwellings (administrative data).

The weight reference period is year Y-1.

The weights are updated annually.

Weights reference period is year Y-1, the weights of elementary aggregates are price-updated to Q4 of year Y-1.

The chaining of the total HPI is achieved by applying the calculated price relatives for quarters of year Y to the values of OOHPI and sub-indices at Q4 of the year Y-1.

See below.

Transfer of ownership.

VAT is included in the price of newly built dwellings.

Other taxes are not included in the price of dwellings.

Government grants are subtracted from the gross figure for Self-built dwellings and Major renovations, when calculating the weight for elementary aggregate O.1.1.1.2.

As HPI is used for the items O.1.1.1.1 and O.1.1.2, land price is included in transaction prices.

However, it is removed when calculating the weight of the sub-index O.1.1.1.1. In certain cases purchasers report separately the price of a newly built dwelling and of the land plot, at which it is located. An average ratio of the building price to the total purchase value is calculated for such transactions. This ratio is then applied to the total value of sales of newly built dwellings to adjust the weight for the elementary aggregate O.1.1.1.1 and exclude the value of land from it.

Housing cooperatives are not very important for the Irish property market and are not marked as such on the source dataset. All market transactions by household buyers, where a stamp duty was paid, are included in the HPI.

The following types of property transactions are considered non-market and are excluded from the calculations of both the indices and the weights:

- Property exchanges and short-term leases (less than 100 years);

- Transactions, where a declared relationship exists between buyer and seller, e.g. relatives, cohabitants;

- Transactions, where the price is below €25,000, or marked as non-market by the Revenue Commissioners;

- Transfers between spouses, civil partners and cohabitants, based on the recorded claim of tax relief.

All other transactions are considered market and included.

Transactions including more than one property are treated as transfers of several identical units for the same price. For example, a transaction of N units for V euro will be treated as N units transferred at V/N euro per unit.

If there is a clear indication that several recorded transactions refer to the same property, e.g. have the same address and the same seller/different buyers or the same buyer/different sellers, they are combined to represent one transaction with the aggregate price.

If there is no clear indication, i.e. a single transaction with unique buyer and seller, it is treated as non-fractional, as there is no way to identify the partial transfer in this case.

See below.

Elementary indices are provided in their final form by the CPI, PPI and HPI, except for the stamp duty sub-index, which is calculated directly from the stamp duty returns to the Revenue Commissioners.

Stamp duty index is calculated by the following method:

- Average quarterly stamp duty rate is calculated by dividing total stamp duty paid in the quarter by the total value of sales in the quarter, net of VAT;

- Stamp duty rate is mutiplied by the total HPI to reflect changes in the underlying value of housing;

- Resulting index is calibrated to be 100 in the base year.

Annually chain-linked Laspeyres formulae is used for elementary aggregates and above.

Elementary indices, other than those for stamp duty, new and existing dwellings, are provided in their final form by other statistical areas,  e.g. CPI and PPI. See the rules for calculation and product replacements in the correspondent metadata documents. 

In calculations of the indices for stamp duty, new and existing dwellings direct pricing is not used, therefore, there are no product replacements involved.

Elementary indices, other than those for stamp duty, new and existing dwellings, are provided in their final form by other statistical areas,  e.g. CPI and PPI. See the rules for quality adjustment in the correspondent metadata documents. 

The indices for new and existing dwellings are based on the corresponding HPI sub-indices, which are calculated using hedonic regression. See details in the Irish metadata for the HPI.

Stamp duty index is not quality-adjusted.

Elementary indices, other than those for stamp duty, new and existing dwellings, are provided in their final form by other statistical areas,  e.g. CPI and PPI. See the rules for treatment of missing prices in the correspondent metadata documents. 

In calculations of the indices for stamp duty, new and existing dwellings direct pricing is not used, therefore, there is no problem of missing prices

Elementary indices, other than those for stamp duty, new and existing dwellings, are provided in their final form by other statistical areas,  e.g. CPI and PPI. See the rules for treatment of discounts and inducements in the correspondent metadata documents. 

The indices for stamp duty, new and existing dwellings do not take discounts and inducements into consideration.

Elementary indices, other than those for stamp duty, new and existing dwellings, are provided in their final form by other statistical areas,  e.g. CPI and PPI. See the rules for treatment of zero prices in the correspondent metadata documents. 

In calculations of the indices for stamp duty, new and existing dwellings transactions at zero prices are considered non-market and excluded.

Elementary indices, other than those for stamp duty, new and existing dwellings, are provided in their final form by other statistical areas,  e.g. CPI and PPI. See the rules for for treatment of VAT in the correspondent metadata documents. 

In calculations of the indices for new and existing dwellings VAT is included in the prices of transacted properties and therefore in HPI and sub-indices O.1.1.1.1 and O.1.1.2.

Stamp duty index is calculated net of VAT, as this is how the stamp duty amount is calculated.

Not applicable.

No comment.