The short answer: on 12 October 2026, 189 applications for 10 or more homes were in for planning in Ireland, waiting on a decision or at appeal. Together they propose 10,177 homes. Cork County has the most, with 22.
Every one of them is a developer who has land, has a scheme drawn, and will need finance, a builder, an agent and buyers. This post shows where they are, how far along they are and how big they are.
Counted on 12 October 2026 from the national planning register and each council's own planning file.
What counts here
- 10 or more homes, as the application states them.
- In for planning: lodged and waiting on a decision, waiting on further information the council asked for, or at appeal with An Coimisiún Pleanála.
- Still current: an application still marked as waiting a year after it was lodged (two years for an appeal) is left out. That usually means the council stopped updating the record, not that it is still live.
Where the schemes are
| Council | Schemes | Homes |
|---|---|---|
| Cork County | 22 | 954 |
| Kilkenny | 14 | 600 |
| Wexford | 14 | 718 |
| Donegal | 13 | 504 |
| Wicklow | 13 | 691 |
| Dublin City | 11 | 584 |
| Louth | 11 | 702 |
| Kildare | 10 | 461 |
| Tipperary | 9 | 306 |
| Cavan | 9 | 304 |
| Offaly | 8 | 204 |
| Meath | 8 | 1,345 |
| Limerick | 7 | 738 |
| Clare | 6 | 367 |
| Laois | 5 | 227 |
| Galway City | 4 | 153 |
| Sligo | 4 | 98 |
| Longford | 4 | 114 |
| Roscommon | 4 | 52 |
| Fingal | 3 | 53 |
| South Dublin | 2 | 437 |
| Leitrim | 2 | 87 |
| Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown | 2 | 72 |
| Carlow | 1 | 62 |
| Kerry | 1 | 259 |
| Monaghan | 1 | 44 |
| Westmeath | 1 | 41 |
The four Dublin councils together have 18 schemes and 1,146 homes. Meath has only eight schemes but 1,345 homes, because one of them is for 757.
Three things that stand out
1. Most schemes are mid-sized. 63 are for 10 to 24 homes and 59 for 25 to 49. Only 13 are for 100 homes or more, but those 13 hold 3,209 homes, nearly a third of the total.
| Size | Schemes | Homes |
|---|---|---|
| 10-24 homes | 63 | 949 |
| 25-49 homes | 59 | 2,164 |
| 50-99 homes | 54 | 3,855 |
| 100-199 homes | 8 | 1,323 |
| 200 homes or more | 5 | 1,886 |
2. Nearly half are waiting on further information. The council has asked 89 of the 189 applicants for more information before it decides. 66 are waiting on a first decision, and 34 are at appeal.
3. Almost every developer has just one scheme in. 175 applicants have one scheme in for planning and seven have two. 154 of the 189 schemes were lodged by a company and 35 by a person in their own name. Most large schemes are lodged by a company set up for that one project, so the name on the application is often not the name on the hoarding.
What this does not cover
- Five councils are missing or out of date. The national register stopped carrying Dublin City's applications in July 2026 and Cork City's in late 2025, and its newest schemes from Galway County, Mayo and Waterford are a year or more old. Their real figures are higher than shown here, and Cork City, Galway County, Mayo and Waterford show none at all.
- Some home counts are read from the description. Cork County, Cork City, Fingal, Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown and Sligo never fill in the number of homes on the national register, so for them we read it from the application's description.
- A scheme in for planning is not a permission. Some will be refused, and some will be granted for fewer homes.
Where Precedent fits
This post is one count, made once. In Precedent it is live, refreshed every week:
- Every scheme on the map and in a list, with its homes, stage, date and the link to the council's file. (Schemes in for planning)
- Who applied, read from each council's own file, because the national register leaves the applicant out, and every scheme that applicant has lodged since 2021.
- A weekly email of new schemes in the councils you pick.
- What happens next: once a scheme is granted, it moves to "Approved, not started" until a commencement notice shows building has begun. (Approved, not started)
If you are a land agent, here is how agents use it. It shows what councils have published, so the coverage gaps above apply in the product too.
Sources: the national planning applications register (the Irish Planning Applications dataset) and the planning files of each council, read 12 October 2026.
Know who is in for planning before the sign goes up
Precedent lists every application for 10 or more homes in for planning, with its stage and who applied, read from each council's own file. Pick your councils and it emails you the new ones every Monday.