House of the week: Crosshaven, Co Cork, €275,000

CASTLEPOINT Court might be a modern enough build, but these three-storey houses owe something to the layout of Victorian or Georgian terraces — and the views from here are classic Cork— pure Crosshaven.

Sq m 186 (2,000 sq ft)

Bedrooms: 4

Bathrooms: 4

BER: C1

No matter what level or way you look out from these early 2000s homes off Crosshaven’s Camden Road, you see the sea, or the Owenbue estuary and lots and lots of boats.

There are masts everywhere, sticking up like porcupine needles in marinas a-plenty, and at moorings, with halyards snapping crisply in the breeze, adding sound to sights; and, when summer and sunny weeks come around, there are simply sails galore.

After all, Crosshaven is home to sailing club the RCYC, which relocated here from Cobh in the 1960s. In five years time, the 1720-founded sailing club will celebrate its 300th anniversary in Crosshaven, when the bunting will fly all the more abundantly and the coastal commuter ‘village’ will go even more into seasonal fete.

Facing up the river towards the sailing club’s berths is Castlepoint Court, where No 20 is the latest market arrival with estate agent Trish Stokes of Lisney. Ms Stokes guides the four-bedroomed No 20 at €275,000, bills the location as idyllic, and says the mid-terraced house itself is bright and very well-kept, with double aspect to its main open plan living/kitchen/dining level.

The Price Register shows sales in the last two years ranging from €140,000 via €190k to €235,000, and a super-smart one with slick interiors and external steel steps to the patios was optimistically offered back in 2010 at €390,000, and a few years early others had boom-time price tags of €500,000.

Many of these circa two dozen houses in a straight-line terrace have been bought down the years by retirees or those attracted by a seaside village setting:there’s convenience to be had, to be sure, with reserved parking and communal grounds beyond private patios (‘though there’s a €650 pa service charge.)

Thanks to a site slope, there are bedrooms (four in all) at the top and bottom levels, with living space in between with balconies on the water aspect side, and the c 2,000 sq ft No 20 has gas heating, and a sound C1 BER. Plus, there’s a wood-burning stove in the main living space, set into a hearth up on a raised, hip-level plinth: go beach-combing after any storm, and you’ll get fuel for free, gratis of the tides.

No 20 is entered at mid-level, with a kitchen just off the quarry-tiled entry hall with wall cut-out adding to the airy feel, and then a dining section leads past the kitchen to a wide-plank, wood-floored living section with virtually all its back wall in glass for the views, with balconybeyond. One of the ground floor bedrooms is en suite, with garden access, and a top floor bedroom has a door to a family bathroom as a sort of en suite option, while there’s also a utility and a guest WC adding to the wash facilities.

Crosshaven’s village amenities are right to hand, a two-minute walk away, with a good Centra, great bars and eating spots, sports fields, boat berths and then there are beaches and stony coves galore around the headland. A short uphill walk takes strollers to historic Camden Fort Meagher with welcoming cafe, open seasonally to tourists, and behind the fort is access to the water’s edge by Graball, facing out to Roches Point and marine traffic, from ferries to tankers, kayaks to dinghies, and dolphins and porpoises.

Back around in the harbour’s lee shelter by Camden Road, Castlepoint Court also faces over the water to that ‘here’s one we prepared earlier, The Terrace, a Victorian row of ten 2,200 sq ft plus terraced homes in Currabinny. There, the elegant refurbished period home, No 2 The Terrace Currabinny, had a price drop of €50,000 with Lisney’s Trish Stokes, now guided at €475,000, and that Terrace under Currabinny woods is sort of a role and row model for the far younger Castlepoint Court in Crosser.

VERDICT: A bit controversial when first built ‘cos of heights, this row of homes is now well bedded down in Crosshaven, about a 20-minute commute (on a good day) via Carrigaline back to Cork city. Of course, you can always cut out the traffic - and take the boat to town.