A lot of house in this Tivoli Cork enclave as auction sale beckons

THERE’S a whopping amount of house at No 2, Bellevue Villas — and a price reduction as it goes up for auction means many would-be buyers will have enough to furnish it in an appropriate manner too. 

It’s the middle house of three very large (c4,000 sq ft), over-basement period houses looking south over the River Lee and the Marina, a mile or so from the city and all three were restored to a very high conservation standard in the early 2000s.

At one stage, they had price tags on resales of €1.5m-plus, but the last sale around 2009 was for just over €700,000. This fine, rock-solid home, mid-ships in the trio No 2 had its price tag reduced in 2012 to €525,000, but that was when little of quality was selling, and it found no takers.

Now, in a market that’s recovered well in 2014, it’s priced at a manageable €375,000 by Sherry FitzGerald, who’ve decided to offer it by auction on November 26, hoping to get viewers in over the fence, and over the line. Get them over the rail line, too: Bellevue Villas is one of just a handful of homes on the cliffside of the Cork/Midleton rail line by Myrtle Hill and Irish Rail (under a legal obligation) put in a new car access bridge a few years ago, reportedly at a remarkable c€15m cost. Build a bridge, and get over it?

The setting is quite exquisite, and internally work has been done to a very high conservation standard, decorated using Mulberry, Zoffany, Osbourn and Little, Colefax and Fowler, and Farrow and Ball products.

No 2 has interconnecting ground-floor reception rooms with galley kitchen off, there’s a magnificent 26’ by 17’ first-floor drawing room above, with en suite master bedroom behind, and five (or more) bedrooms on the next two levels. The basement is fully self-contained, but also part of the home above it, with old-world, stone-flagged floors.

VERDICT: The word ‘enclave’ could have been coined for Tivoli’s Bellvue Villas. It’s a special setting, and great value at the guide if bidding doesn’t go wild.

Tivoli, Cork €375,000 (auction)

Sq m 371 (4,000 sq ft)

Bedrooms: 6 +basement

Bathrooms 4

BER: Exempt