Limerick mayor John Moran gets more than €300,000 in yearly rent from his transatlantic property portfolio.
He owns 23 properties in Ireland and the US – among them a Manhattan apartment he lets for $6,700 a month – according to a recently filed ethics return obtained by The Ditch.
The Ditch reported in June that Moran charges up to €1,400 a month for a single room in his Limerick city co-living development. He recently said high rents are driving young people away from the county.
Moran has said he wants “to be the mayor who delivers a Vienna model of affordable housing for Limerick”.
Two apartments = about €10,000 a month in rent
Last month John Moran submitted his first ethics return to Limerick City and County Council.
He owns a co-living development at the Crescent, Limerick city, which is divided into five apartments and eight studios. The Ditch previously reported that the building generates around €15,000 a month in rent.
He also owns two rental properties in Pery Court and a home in nearby Pery Square, which he intends to renovate and use as his private residence.
This is in addition to his home in Raheen and a property on Glantworth Street, which he owns through his lobbying firm, RHH International.
Moran owns another commercial property in Limerick city at 32 Parnell Street, which he says is “held through a pension plan and agreed to be sold”.
Meanwhile a property he owns in Chapelizod, Dublin 8 is described as his “residence when working in Dublin”.
Though Moran discloses ownership of property in the US and France, his ethics form notes he is “not required to include properties outside of the state.”
The Ditch can reveal however that Moran owns a pair of two-bedroom apartments on East 11th Street in Manhattan. New York state records show he bought the first apartment in the late 1990s.
According to a real estate listing the apartment was let about four years ago for $4,800 (€4,400) a month.
The Limerick man bought a second apartment in the same building for $1.65 (€1.5) million in 2015. It was recently let for $6,700 (€6,100) a month.
The former Department of Finance adviser’s portfolio also includes a 13th-century medieval property in Cordes-sur-Ciel, a commune in the south of France.
