You may strike a good deal in this listed city building

STEADY nerves, and a bit of prior experience, are needed – but there’s quite possibly a good deal in the offing here.

The sale by tender of a city period home and garden, acquired under a 19-year old Derelict Sites Act, holds the promise of a new life for 20 Connaught Place after several previous bids to sell.

The pre-Famine terraced Georgian house, in fairly rag order, but winsomely placed on Wellington Road in Cork city alongside some recently re-gentrified homes, has been both run down and let down, over the years.

Open to the elements for years, and now open to bidders, it went up for auction in December 2007, selling for a remarkable €500,000 under the auctioneer’s gavel. However, the purchaser’s circumstances changed rapidly after the purchase, and good enough sense prevailed from vendors Cork City Council to allow the contract be revoked.

Then a tender sale date came again quite recently, and went due to a clerical error, so now there’s a new date in this house’s almost 200 year history, and it is May 21.

Hopeful buyers need to get their financial house in order in jig-time, though, along with knowing just what they aim to do with the 1,880 sq ft four-storey house.

Detailed tender applications need to be accompanied with a 10% deposit of the price being offered – and no price guide is being given.

One thing for sure, bidding/tender offers aren’t going to go crazy this time, and in any case the local authority’s decision whom to sell to isn’t even limited to highest offer. Could there even be a real bargain here? In any case, conserving and upgrading the listed property will be financially onerous, and possibly even stressful.

A time schedule for completion of works will have to be outlined and agreed, and while the balance of the purchase price won’t have to be paid until works are complete, neither will the buyer get ownership of the property until then, so effectively he or she will be renovating and restoring under licence in the interim.

Selling agent advising Cork City Council is Gerard O’Dea of Downing Commercial, who says the property needs complete renovation.

Any would-be viewers will have to take his word for what’s inside as its derelict state means the local authority’s insurers forbid public access to it.

However, the Irish Examiner did pick a way through it in late 2007 and vouched then that it was, indeed, in a parlous state: the roof is gone, the floor are rotten – but, peculiarly, the stairs is good, and its original period features haven’t been altered, only affected by time, water, weather, etc. Hold fast to that stair rail, and let the bravest soul win.