Rock solid investment

Tommy Barker

Definitely a do-er upper when sold back in the 1990s, damp and hemmed in with overgrowth, it has come hugely closer to its real potential after an on-going programme of renewal hence its 2005 €1 million guide price.

Located a couple of miles from Innishannon, a 15-minute drive west of Cork city and airport, close to Brinny and Bandon, the period home is on over six acres of grounds, mostly in sloping lawns, some native woodland, a river/stream at its furthermost boundary and a trout-filled pond at the property's extremity, scooped out by the house's busy-bee family of occupants.

Estate agents Henry O'Leary of the Property Partners network, who lives locally, reckons Rockfort House's next owners will come from between here and Cork city, or from the UK the requisite 'space for ponies' will be a real draw for this family-friendly spot, and he notes that detached houses in the Spires development in Innishannon village will now sell for between €600,000 and €700,000.

Rockfort House, with over 4,000 sq ft of quirky space scattered about plus three beamed attic rooms adding further space, has a history dating back to the 1700s, but clearly has been through several transformations. Owners Paul and Ann Kingston, former restaurateurs in Cork city, have found roof beams with a late 1800s date pencilled in on them by the carpenters of the time, but these may simply reflect a 19th century re-roofing job.

Locals have told them there was an even older house elsewhere on the grounds carrying the original Rockfort House name, and that it was demolished and re-located to its current site for the pastoral valley views of rolling parkland, cereal crops and just-harvested round bales. When Paul and Ann bought this place, it had unusual Dutch gables on either side, and their faint outline can still be seen in the stripped-back stonework. They straightened and re-ordered the roof sections because of severe problems with the roof valleys, and say the house with oil heating now is dry as a bone.

With every room worked on to a greater or lesser extent, and with a good element of originality left (though all windows are PVC replacements), it is an individual mix of the old and the new, highly adaptable and with the option of a virtually self-contained ground floor granny flat on one side, and with four overhead bedrooms, two with spacious ensuite bathrooms.

Outside are old stables and a workshed, productive organic gardens and young orchard, and the interior goes up hill and down dale, with no fewer than four levels in the kitchen/dining room to the rear. This homely spot with a 24' high ceiling in portions has a mezzanine office, cooking space with Smeg oven, and dining room with oil-fired Aga. Living/reception rooms are varied, with two good large rooms to the front with bay windows, and a linked play room leads on to a huge sheltered patio and play space: the home-made kids' climbing frame here would put most municipal amenities to shame.