Big house records smashed

DESPITE the economic downturn, it isn’t necessarily a bad time to be selling a multi-million euro Irish house.

It’s buyer flew in from abroad and saw off stiff competition from old Cork families and others, driving its selling price from its €2.5 million guide with Lisneys to close to a staggering 4 million. It is a new house price record for Cork and one of the strongest deals anywhere in the country this year (see further details below).

Sailing into a surprisingly buoyant Autumn house market, meanwhile, is Westview, a Georgian home on a full 10 acres of prime land, 14 miles west of Cork city at Aglish, Farran.

Westview is due to sell by public auction on October 2 with Joe McCarthy of Irish and European, who doesn’t give a guide price, but the likelihood is that it will sell for €1.5m-€2 million.

He feels it will be bought by a professional family, looking for a very good country house with land.

Farmers who have sold land for development in the last few years are also likely to make a play for the superb block of land, mostly in tillage but suitable for a range of farming activities including stud farm.

The fully restored two-storey Georgian house has four bedrooms, three reception rooms, kitchen, office and a sheltered inner yard with out-buildings, plus one-bed staff accommodation. Close to the Witness the shock sale result of Gortalough in Cork’s Rochestown after just two months on the market for close to €4 million.

Lee Valley Golf Course, it has extensive road frontage and is privately set in the middle of the land with long stud post and hedged approach avenue.

“The auction gives prospective purchasers an opportunity to acquire 100 acres right in the heart of mid-Cork, combined with an elegant period house,” said Mr McCarthy.

Also at nearby Ovens, a recently-built Georgian-styled house on six acres, Beechmount, is under active negotiation with a price guide of €1.5 million with estate agent Dominic Daly.

However, the market , reeling under forecasts of slumps and bubbles bursting but growing still according to the latest Bank of Ireland figures, will be heartened by the sale of Gortalough in Cork for close to €4 million. Estate agent Margaret Kelleher of Lisneys pulled off the amazing deal in record time. A statement issued by Lisneys and agreed with the sellers and purchaser would only say “the price attained well exceeded the asking price of €2.5m, and included some attached grounds not originally offered by the vendor.” However, one line, “this sale represents the largest price ever paid for a private residence in Cork,” indicates the price was indeed close to the 4m hinted at by sources close to an under-bidder: the previous record was c £3 million for Clayton Love jnr’s family house Clanricarde on the Blackrock Road. Clanricarde was bought on three acres of land, with development potential, by a buyer from the UK with Cork family connections, and well over €1 million has since been spent on that house.

Gortalough has 10,000 sq ft of space on over three acres on the Rochestown Road, and has been virtually re-built in the past few years since it last set another record as the first-ever £1 million house sale in Cork. Its buyer, an Irish businessman currently based overseas, “intends to keep Gortalough as a private residence and has no plans for commercial development,” said the brief statement.