Dublin City Council (DCC) has issued a procurement notice seeking contractors to participate in a €2.5 billion, four-year house-building programme targeting 4,000 social and affordable homes across the capital, as reported by The Irish Times.

The council intends to establish two four-year multiparty contractor framework agreements, utilising primarily the design-and-build delivery model. The frameworks will form an important component of DCC's direct social and affordable housing delivery pipeline for the period 2026 to 2030.

A two-stage restricted procurement process will be used to establish the frameworks. DCC is seeking to shortlist a minimum of five entities for its Lot A framework, covering contracts valued between €100 million and €250 million, and a minimum of six for Lot B, covering works valued at less than €100 million.

Twenty-six sites have been identified for inclusion across the programme, with further sites potentially added over the lifetime of the frameworks. DCC has already secured planning permission for 13 of those sites, with responsibility for obtaining consents on the remaining sites resting with the council.

Sites with planning permission in place include 167 units at Stanley Street in Dublin 7, 171 homes at Basin View in Dublin 8, 171 units at Cherry Orchard Avenue in Dublin 8, 288 properties at the Ballymun LAP site, and 110 units at the Church of the Annunciation in Finglas.

Sites yet to secure planning consent include 500 units at Belmayne in Dublin 3, 250 homes at Sillogue Road in Ballymun, 243 units at Sarsfield Road in Dublin 10, 200 units at Cromcastle in Dublin 17, and 200 homes at Kildonan Lands in Finglas, among others.

Applicants have until 5 August to submit pre-qualification submissions. DCC intends to have both frameworks in place and first contracts awarded by the first quarter of 2027.

The programme represents one of the most substantial direct public housing procurement exercises undertaken by an Irish local authority in recent years, with the scale of the framework designed to give contractors sufficient visibility to plan resourcing and supply chain capacity across a multi-year delivery programme.