Have a nose around Shrone: €675k Fern House is fresh on the market

Refurbished Glengarriff home with landscaped gardens and two chalets offers coastal living and income potential in West Cork

Fern House, Shrone, Glengarriff

Shrone, Glengarriff
€675,000
Size	140 sq m (1,500 sq ft)
Bedrooms	3/4 + 1 + 1
Bathrooms	2
BER	C1

Very much rooted in its locale is Glengarriff’s Fern House: it was built at the foot of Shrone mountain/hill back in 1962 by a local builder, and an energy upgrade done a decade ago put in locally grown Glengarriff solid oak floors on top of insulation, while alongside it are two chalets, called Gorse and Heather.

Fern, Gorse, and Heather? So West Cork.

An immaculately-presented property mix, in a super-scenic Bantry Bay/Glengarriff Bay setting, Fern House and its two small wooden chalets (currently let to two, single refugees from the ongoing war in Ukraine) are fresh to market for its house and garden-proud owners.

Selling for the couple with Cork city and South American roots is Bantry auctioneer Denis Harrington, who pins a €675,000 AMV to the combination a few miles out from Glengarriff, on the Adrigole/Castletownbere road, facing Garinish Island.

Rising up behind through rock and moorland is the 280m/900ft high Shrone hill, said to have its name from the Irish for ‘nose’ because of its shape. It’s one of the string of peaks in the Caha Mountains, which are crowned by Hungry Hill further out on the Beara peninsula.

The area is known for walks and hikes and trails, with swimmers, kayakers, and sailors all catered for at nearby Ellen’s Rock, says Mr Harrington, adding that the planting at Fern House is so beautifully cultivated you could be forgiven for thinking that the gardens and courtyard were a little piece of ‘Garinish Island’ heaven.

One of the owners of Fern House had previously renovated a West Cork/Macroom area farmhouse, so knew how hard it can be to work with older stone dwellings. Here he took this place in hand and stripped it back to the bare walls, taking up floors, and replacing electrics and plumbing in 2015/2016.

Work included internal walls getting 60mm high density Kingspan insulation slab, flooring has 25mm of similar underneath, the attic has 300mm Knauf wool (double layer), ground floor ceilings have 100mm similar insulation, and the vaulted ceiling in the kitchen’s new/replacement pitched roof (with A-section gable and three Veluxes) has a 60mm slab plus 100mm of Knauf wool.

Plant holders hang from the raised ceiling beams, as happy indoors as the outside planting is (the wisteria on the rear pergola’s a gem) and there’s also a polycarbonate-roofed sheltering section over decking, with raised planters.

Fern House has a ground floor bedroom/home office, three first floor bedrooms, main bathroom with sink set on a vintage distressed dresser section, guest WC, and utility, while the main living areas/ kitchen/ dining link around two sides and the back of the house in a sort of three section combo, getting light deep in thanks to a glazed A-section addition on the rear extension.

The home has triple glazing to the front, has a wood-burning stove and oil central heating (the BER’s a C1) and one of the owners says having lived in an old farmhouse, they love the ability to walk around here at home barefoot, in comfort.

The external area is landscaped, yet low-maintenance, set up by the occupants for their retirement years, until plans changed. The beds have double weed-preventive membranes, there’s no lawn, and only boundary hedges for occasional cutting, all behind electric access gates with separate access for the chalets Gorse (330 sq ft) and Heather (237 sq ft), and to the 1,500 sq ft Fern House itself.

VERDICT: Well-updated 1960s detached house with income earning/family guest chalets in one of Munster’s most scenic settings.