Trading Up: Ballinlough, Cork, €340,000

The onward march of price recovery is seen in Cork’s suburban Ballinlough, where an upgraded three-bed semi with attached former garage/bed four is now priced at €340,000 on its market launch this month.

No 22 Pic Du Jer is a fresh listing with agent Jeremy Murphy, and was underpinned, replumbed, rewired, and insulated around 2012... a bit after it last appeared (albeit misleadingly so) on the Price Register.

That register shows a transaction at No 22 back in 2011 for €24,120, but it carried a ‘two-asterisk’ caveat that the figure didn’t represent the house’s full market value, and so possibly was a inter-family transfer or a part-purchase.

No, things never got so bad that Pic Du Jer’s prices fell to that level and in fact they nudged from the €200ks into the €300ks around 2014, again with the caveat that various properties sold in this handy setting off the Ballinlough Road were in various stages of presentation or undress.

No 22’s a good representation of these late 1930s era homes, as it hasn’t been hugely extended, but clearly tweaked and made more modern in feel.

There’s now the option of a fourth bedroom or playroom use to the side, in lieu of a former garage under a slated roof, and the back reception/dining room now links via an arch to a kitchen, with gloss and timber units put in in recent years.

Estate agent Jeremy Murphy says No 22’s deceptively spacious, and there’s a ground floor guest WC now too, and overhead are three bedrooms, plus main bathroom .

VERDICT: A clean buy