The Government is planning to purchase Citywest Hotel in west Dublin to expand accommodation for asylum seekers on the site
The acquisition could house up to 1,000 applicants doubling its current capacity of 764 beds and is estimated to cost around €100 million.
The government has been using the hotel, owned by Cape Wrath Hotel Unlimited (part of Tetrarch Capital), as a key transit hub for asylum seekers since 2022, with payments exceeding €70.8 million in 2024 alone for accommodating migrants.
The purchase aligns with a broader strategy to shift away from private sector reliance, committing to 14,000 state-owned beds by 2028 to address the accommodation crisis. Cabinet approval for the deal was expected to be considered as early as May 2025, following the scrapping of a controversial plan to use a former paint factory in Coolock.
The plan would remove Citywest, Ireland’s largest hotel with 492-rooms, from the hospitality sector. The hotel also has a golf course and large conference and function room facilities. It served as the venue for the ITAA conference in 2004 and 2005, and the Worldchoice conferences of 2002 and 2006.
The hotel’s 6010 yard par-69 golf course, which has also been closed, hosted the Iveco Irish Masters Championship in 1994 and the Ladies Irish Open in 1996. Citywest Hotel hosted the World Grand Prix darts tournament.
