The first three months of this year has seen a noticeable number of Irish funds looking at the Irish property sector again, according to Savills.
The property consultants say that this will bring a renewed confidence to the market and will lead to greater activity for the rest of the year.
An analysis of the turnover figures for the first quarter of the year has shown that Private Irish / Irish funds acquiring €165.6million / 49pc of turnover; Americans were the next largest buyers acquiring €91 million or 27pc of market share, with Germans acquiring €40 million or 11pc of market share.
Savills say there was a noticeable shortage of new stock coming to the market in the first quarter of 2013, with most activity by agents including completing deals which had been agreed in 2012, and also preparing new assets for marketing.
Jacqueline Fitzpatrick of Savills commented: "Over 33 investment property sales were completed in the first quarter, with transactions amounting to €350 million. This compares with a turnover of €17 million for Q1 2012 - a remarkable increase. However turnover for Q1 2012 was particularly low due to the Government's proposal to retrospectively ban upward only rent reviews on existing leases. This had spooked investors and almost halted the investment market in 2011.
"This issue was resolved in December 2011, however it did take a few months for transactions to complete after this, and hence there was a lull in turnover even after the issue had been resolved. Since then investors have shown a renewed confidence in the Irish market, as evidenced by the marked increase in Q1 2013. Savills say there is strong demand from foreign buyers, particularly from the US, Germany, the UK, Israel and Australia".
Prime initial yields are currently in the region of 6.75pc for offices, 9.0pc for industrial, 6.0pc for retail high street, and 7.5pc for shopping centres.
