Land prices are stabilising
The price of land has dropped by 9.3% nationally, the estate agent says, but regionally there have been price increases in the order of almost 20%.
The annual land price survey of 401 properties throughout the country, is based on 113 quantified sales, and gives a snapshot of the market for 2010.
Compared to the residential market, where prices declined by double digits in 2010, the agricultural land market has performed well in the past 12 months, according to the survey, with an average of €8,776 per acre for agricultural land in 2010.
This represents a drop of 9.3%, compared to 43.3% in 2009, says Knight Frank — which supports its conclusion of stabilisation in the market.
Generally, the Pale comes out best, with land prices and sales activity up near Dublin, and the highest average price, at €13,055 per acre, up 19.5% from the 2009 figures of €10,920, in the survey.
In the midlands, sales were up on 2009 levels, but prices were down by as much as 26% in some instances. The average price for land recorded in the midlands was €8,286 per acre, compared to €11,318 in 2009.
In the south, the estate agent found an average price of just under €8,000 per acre for Cork, Tipperary, Kerry and Limerick, on the basis of 17 properties sold, a drop from an average of €12,447 in 2009.
This sample doesn’t include all sales, and it includes some of the poorest and lowest priced land in the country with areas where there have been breakthrough price levels this year.
In the south east, a total of 19 sales were recorded, with prices averaging €7,287 per acre for Kilkenny, Carlow, Wexford and Waterford, a 27.8% decrease on the 2009 average price of €10,090. The North Sloblands in Co Wexford was the largest sale in the country this year, with 1,220 acres sold for €4,713 per acre, or a total of €5.57 million. It was sold by Tralee’s Lee Strand Dairy and purchased by a Wexford businessman. The property had been on the market for upwards of three years, and was originally floated at €10 million, but changed hands for half of its original asking price.
In the north west, activity matched the winter freeze which afflicted the area so badly. The Knight Frank sample shows just nine reported land sales in the north west and west for 2010, six less than the previous year, and with average prices coming in at just over €5,386 per acre, surprisingly up on the previous year’s level.
In the north east, there were 11 recorded sales with an average of €8,375 paid per acre in 2010, down 38.5% from the previous year’s €13,624 per acre.
Robert Ganly, head of country and residential sales at Knight Frank Ireland, says the decline of 9.3% means agricultural land is still very good value. “It has performed far better than the residential market, which has declined by double digits in the last 12 months.
“While liquidity in the banking sector was still very much an issue in terms of sales, one of the features of the market over the past 12 months, which is likely to continue, is the re-emergence of farmers in the marketplace, with the majority of properties being bought by farming families,” he concluded.
