Property prices: Can I ask your view on property prices? Nationally it is suggested that prices are only increasing by a couple of percent but in one article you suggest prices in Dublin 6 have increased by 15 per cent.

A friend suggests prices in Raheny have increased by around 20 per cent since the beginning of the year. So where are prices falling to give an average increase of a few percent and/or what is there to suggest the froth has gone off the market?

As it is economists who come up with the statistics, we went to a property economist for the answer to this one. Paul Murgatroyd of Douglas Newman Good explains that, in the last couple of years, different sectors of the residential market have returned varying levels of price rises, and this is reflected in the price indices released by the different institutions - for example, Permanent TSB/ESRI house price index, Department of the Environment housing statistics quarterly bulletins, and Douglas Newman Good's house price gauge to name but a few.

The mid-to-upper level of Dublin's second-hand residential market continues to be the best performing sector in the country, as demand continues to outstrip supply in areas such as Dublin 6 and Dublin 4, for example.

As a result, prices in these areas have risen a lot faster than other areas.

Murgatroyd stresses that in no sector of the market are prices falling, it is simply the case that the rate of price increases is determined solely by the type and variety of data analysed. For example, a sample that contains a lot of data on new homes sales, or a lot of data from areas outside Dublin, will currently be recording lower levels of price increase than say a sample that contains a lot of data from the Dublin second-hand market which will be recording much higher levels of increase.

Where can we find out about radon ratings?

As American buyers we are familiar with radon ratings but find that houses for sale here do not automatically come with their radon ratings. We are looking for a holiday home in Ireland this year and wonder if there is any way to find out the radon situation in a house?

People in Ireland are only now becoming aware of the dangers of radon gas and there is a national organisation, the Radiological Protection Institute of Ireland (RPII), charged with regulating, monitoring and advising on radon.

You are unlikely to discover about the radon status of a particular house unless the owners have themselves had it measured, but you can find out about a particular geographical area by looking at the national survey results on the RPII's website (www.rpii.ie) which will tell you where the high radon areas are.