But whatever figures you work from, whoever your analyst of preference may be, there is one distinct message . . . the only way is up.

Some say Dublin house prices went up by 21.9% on average last year, others that values in the capital rose by 10%. Some say the average for a Dublin house is 368,576, others that it is 468,273 However, as Paul Murgatroyd, economist with Douglas Newman Good argues, "the bottom line is that trends are all going the same way, and those trends say house prices showed a marked increase in the second half of 2005".

The DNG stats recorded an increase of 4.5% in the last quarter of last year . . . an upswing Murgatroyd says hasn't happened since the boom days of 1998.

The same trend appears in the widely-used research undertaken by the ESRI economist David Duffy for Permanent TSB.

They show house prices growing at twice the rate in the second half of the year (6.7%) than in the first half of the year (2.5%), again the strongest late-year growth since 1997. As Permanent TSB head of marketing Niall O'Grady puts it: "We predicted the trends accurately for the last nine-and-a-half years. I suppose you have to get it wrong some time."

But when almost 500 houses sell at auction for over 1m, when the average price is rising in Dublin . . . by DNG's figures at 230 a day . . . and when about 7% of first-time buyers now opt for 100% mortgages and when the Central Bank cautions once again about personal debt, is there some point at which we reach a price ceiling?

After all, percentage rises are one thing, hard cash is quite another.

One of the most telling figures from the ESRI-Permanent TSB review of our recent property history is the fact that in 1996, 97% of houses were under 150,000 and a minute number were over 400,000, while in 2005, only 4% were under 150,000, with the vast bulk of houses (85%) priced at between 150,000 and 400,000 and the rest costing much more.

When you look at such a radical change in the distribution of price, you have to wonder whether at some point we will hit a wall.

Is there some sort of cut-off point . . . in actual numbers, in real money . . . beyond which we cannot go?

Not so, says Murgatroyd.

And certainly not now. It's all about what we can afford . . .

and our confident attitude towards carrying debt while the good times roll.

"When you think back to the times when the price of a pint was an old shilling and the addition of a penny on price of pint in the budget brought front-page headlines and was the subject of a national debate, you wouldn't have believed that at some stage in 2005 you would have to pay 4.50 for a pint of Guinness in some establishments, " says Murgatroyd.

"The same goes for the price of a house. Dublin is now an international, cosmopolitan city that is expanding at a remarkable rate and prices reflect that."

They also reflect demand, the ability of supply to meet that demand and our collective wealth and ability to pay.

At present, all those factors, as we have heard ad nauseam in the past few weeks, are on an upward curve. We enjoy almost full employment.

The dogs in the street are now able to roll off our national economic growth forecast of 5% for 2006.

A proportion of the 15bn injection into the economy from the SSIAs will seep into property over the next two years.

Tax cuts in the budget will allow us to service the higher repayments which higher interest rates will cause and the larger debt we will have to take on to buy higher-priced houses.

Some 55,000-plus people are likely to migrate here this year, our population is set to hit five million by 2020 with Dublin's population alone reaching two million . . . with adults wanting to rent or buy.

The only negatives are a small rise in interest rates and the fact that a lot of people now believe construction (at 24%) now accounts for too great a proportion of the overall economy .

Nobody believes either will prevent the current, unexpected boom continuing apace. And according to everyone, this year is likely to be as strong . . . if not stronger in some parts . . . than last.