Live in the lap of luxury right on the waterfront

COASTAL Kerry town Kenmare has been awash with newly-built holiday homes in the past few years, with pending major town centre developments.

But while the mid-market and holiday home/investment market is more than well served, it is only in the past year that the very upper end has been getting a surge of new supply.

Both the Kenmare Park and Sheen Falls hotels are selling luxury properties to Ireland’s newly minted elite, the latter hotel in conjunction with McCarthy Developments.

Among the top Munster house sellers last year was Dawros Point, a large Victorian replica home on 11 waterside acres, which made a spectacular €5 million through Cork agent Dominic Daly.

Now joining the rather elite throng, but on a smaller scale, are the four big houses in The Waterfront, which is off the Killowen road on the Cork/Killorglin side of the booming town.

What sets these four apart, says Elaine Daly of Sherry FitzGerald Daly, is that each has direct access to the water’s edge.

They are also very large, well specified, contemporary in styling and have a southerly aspect and views to the Caha Mountains — and they’re €1.5 million a throw.

They overlook the Kenmare Estuary and the Sheen Falls Hotel, on private grounds of up to a quarter an acre each, and run to 2,700 sq ft of split-level living space, with a modest approach to the upper level on sloping sites giving way to imposing facades facing the water.

Ms Daly predicts “the buyers will be Irish, buying maybe for holiday use initially, but hoping to retire to them later on”.

A year ago, Forbes magazine identified Kenmare as one of the top towns in the world for retirees, and greying heads have been nodding in agreement ever since.

Scheme developers Killowen View has also built 16 other smaller holiday homes on the remainder of the site.

Completion for the Waterfront homes is anticipated for a year’s time. Each will be finished “to a five-star standard”, says Ms Daly.

Features include ‘smart home’ technology links for IT and entertainment connectivity, walnut joinery, oil-fired and underfloor heating, a games room, power showers in all four of the en suite bedrooms, a sun terrace off the upper level sitting room (levels are called ground and lower ground, with living on top, and sleeping underneath) and private grounds, accessed via electronic gates, with up to €50,000 worth of landscaping per site.

Accommodation includes a 22’ by 15’ sitting room, a similar-sized fitted kitchen, a dining room which has a curved break-out space, a games room, utility room and four en suite bedrooms with walk-in wardrobes.

Design is by Kerry firm Hickey Moynihan.