Buyers sure to swoop on superb tillage farm
On the market with joint agents, Joe McCarthy of Irish and European and Roy Dennehy of Dennehy Auctioneers, the property and its residence, Kilnagleary House, is a once in a blue moon sale and has a number of attributes on offer.
Firstly, it has superb tillage and grazing land in a recognisably good farming area and access is also good, with frontage on two sides of this single block holding.
Thirdly, the farm is a residential holding with a substantial, six-bedroomed bungalow at its centre and is accessed via a long driveway from a secondary road.
The house, while in need of attention, was designed by Boyd Barrett Architects over 50 years ago and is set in a mature belt of trees but with panoramic views over Currabinny and the tidal waters of the Owenabue below.
At one stage this was a dairy farm and part of a much large holding.
Kilnagleary House is minutes from Carrigaline, on the Crosshaven Road, and has access onto the main Fountainstown road and a secondary road, from which the avenue to the house begins.
This dormer bungalow, which is a little Arts & Crafts in style, has 3,500 sq ft of space, (it was substantially extended by the present owners) and is surrounded by mature gardens with access to the main farm yard. Now comprising mostly older stone buildings and a former dairy, the yard probably dates back to the time of the original Kilnagleary House.
The site carries some considerable history having been a monastic centre in the time of St Finbarr, in the area between the industrial estate and the Owenabue estuary. The significance of the location wasn’t lost on the Normans and they built a castle and latterly a church in the same area.
According to Roy Dennehy of Dennehy’s auctioneers, the land is suitable for grazing or tillage and a good dairy enterprise was carried out here when the farm was a much large size.
Leased for some time, it’s presently under wheat and grass and is fed by a natural spring which never runs dry, he says. The house is also fed by gravity from the same supply, he adds. Had this farm come on the market five years ago, the price would be in multiples of millions.
Today, however, the guide is a reasonable, €800,000 for a piece of ground that has been looted, lusted and fought over for a recorded millennium — a sure indication of the quality of location.
Some places just never go out of fashion.
