Dundalk native Maria Doyle-Cuche, who represented Ireland in the 1987 Eurovision Song Contest as Maria Christian, was among the 13 recipients of Distinguished Service Award for the Irish Abroad for 2023.
A new company will advise parents and grandparents on remortgaging homes to help children onto the housing ladder.
Tembo, which describes itself as a family lending platform, enables first-time buyers to get on the housing ladder by brokering a small interest-only mortgage on their parents - or another family member or friend s - home.
The money from the benefactor - which Tembo refers to as the homebooster - is then put towards the child s mortgage deposit, allowing them to buy their first property.
However, this route to homeownership comes with risks, as we explain below.
On the ladder: First-time buyers Jim Labisko, 49, and Sophie Gardner, 33, are using Tembo to help them buy their first properties with assistance from their parents