Who needs Jersey Shore with a blue flag beach on the doorstep of €495,000 Killeagh home

Open plan living was key in the design of this Ballinteosig home

Ballinteosig, Killeagh

Killeagh, East Cork
€495,000
Size	262 sq m (2820 sq ft)
Bedrooms	5
Bathrooms	3
BER	B1

THE Jersey Shore, that inspiring stretch of coastline so integral to the lyrics of Bruce Springsteen, is where Christy Harte headed in 1988, accompanied by his wife Jan, with no more than a couple of holdalls between them. Eleven years later, they returned home with two children in tow and enough possessions to fill a shipping container.

“We left Ireland with a couple of bags in 1988 and we came home in 1999 with a family and a 40’ container,” Christy says.

Not everything the couple brought home was tangible. They imported some ideas too, such as an appreciation of the American style of open-plan living. “We decided we’d like to build in that style,” Christy says.

Initially, they rented in Cork city but grew nervous as house prices started to spiral. As time went by and the deposit they’d saved in the States looked increasingly inadequate, they bought a house in Castlemartyr “just to get on the property ladder”, while all the time scouring for a site.

When Christy saw one advertised in Ballinteosig, outside the East Cork village of Killeagh, just 15 minutes from a blue flag beach in Youghal and 15 minutes from Midleton, he went and bought the acre. As an electrician, he had a good skillset to bring to the build.

The design for the house was largely their own.

Having done up “a bunch of sketches” they brought them to Midleton-based architect Michael Cummins, who refined the drawings. The house was a self-build.

“It wasn’t the first house I built and I had a good idea of what I wanted,” Christy says.

He took a year off from his job to oversee the project. They moved in on December 10, 2005, 11 months after breaking ground “When we built it, we decided to future-proof it, so we installed a geothermal heating system and a heat recovery ventilation system. A lot of that stuff was barely on the market back then,” Christy says.

He tested it for air-tightness and the house performed well — at almost 20 years old, it has a B1 energy rating.

People in the East Cork area subsequently started calling him up for advice on future-proofing their own homes. He never returned to working as an electrician.

“I’ve been doing air-tightness insulation all over East Cork for the past 16 years,” he says.

Visitors to their home have been impressed by the open-plan design.

“The house is deceptive from the front. When people walk in it’s like ‘wow, I didn’t expect that,’” he says.

With its lofted ceiling and exposed beams, the kitchen/dining/living room is an impressive space, with light flooding in from all angles, through floor-to-ceiling windows and double doors that lead to the rear garden. 

The main bedroom has French doors to the rear patio.

 A spiral staircase leads from the kitchen/dining area to an upstairs studio storage space.

Outside is well maintained and mature laurel hedging round the boundary is a terrific windbreaker. The rear patio faces south “and is a lovely suntrap”, Christy says.

John Hornibrook of Colbert & Co is selling the house and he received an early offer of the asking (€495,000).

“There’s really nice interest in the house. There’s a really nice feel to it, a lot of thought went into it and it’s really held up”, the agent says.

As for Christy and Jan, the 262sq m house was never their retirement plan. They have their sights set on splitting their retirement between Ireland and Spain — travelling a little lighter once again.

VERDICT: A house ahead of its time with an energy rating that qualifies buyers for green mortgage rates. Turnkey family home with great outdoor space.