Many Irish consumers will be worse off by at least \u20ac1,000 a year as a direct consequence of the war in the Middle East with the full impact of the conflict yet to be felt, experts have suggested. <\/p>\n
Even if the deal between the US<\/a> and Iran<\/a> holds, the war\u2019s aftershocks will keep the price of products including food, oil, gas, plastics, packaging, building materials and fertiliser elevated for months with consumers bearing the ultimate consequences. <\/p>\n The European Central Bank<\/a> (ECB) increased its interest rates late last week<\/a>, which added hundreds of euro on to the cost of home loans for tens of thousands of mortgage holders.<\/p>\n A second increase was considered likely within weeks and would push costs even higher for tracker holders while putting pressure later in the year on homeowners coming out of fixed rate agreements and those on variable rates. <\/p>\n Daragh Cassidy of price comparison and switching site bonkers.ie identified the key concerns for households this year as mortgage rates, energy prices and food. <\/p>\n \u201cThe ECB has already hiked rates once and there\u2019s a strong possibility it\u2019ll hike rates another two times before the end of the year,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n \u201cFor someone with, say, \u20ac150,000 left on a tracker over 10 to 15 years, they could end up paying just over \u20ac50 a month extra on their repayments or over \u20ac600 a year.\u201d<\/p>\n He warned fixed mortgage rates for new customers are also likely to creep up with those coming to the end of their current fixed rate this year or next set to face higher repayments than they may have been expecting. <\/p>\n Speaking to The Irish Times<\/a>, the co-head of geopolitical strategy at EY Ireland Simon MacAllister warned that even if a deal to end the war holds, it will take months to get oil and gas production back to pre-war levels after which all the refineries will have to \u201cresynchronise\u201d which could take a year. <\/p>\n \u201cWhen we think about the impact, we\u2019re talking about plastics and packaging and the components of fertiliser, all of which go into the food and grocery category,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n \u201cProducts that were seeds when planted in the spring were planted using diesel that was more expensive and they were fertilised with fertiliser that has got more expensive,\u201d he added. <\/p>\n