1,500 vacant houses and 983 homeless

Finance Minister Sammy Wilson has revealed that at January 22 there were a total of 1,500 vacant residential properties in the city and that 1,087 of these were houses.

Last week it was revealed Londonderry has the second highest number of applicants (983) in Northern Ireland accepted by the Housing Executive (NIHE) as homeless.

Now Mr Wilson has revealed that there are 1,500 properties lying empty in the city.

He stated: “Of the 1,500 vacant residential properties within the Derry City Council Area as at January 22, (a) 1,087 were houses, (b) 339 were flats and 74 were other types of property.

“Of the 1,500 properties, 28 were formerly non-domestic properties. It is not possible to identify whether any of these properties were former small business premises.

“Of the 1,415 properties where the number of bedrooms was recorded, 153 had one bedroom, 338 had two bedrooms and 924 had three or more bedrooms.”