Selling a cottage done to builder’s finish, €345k, is it an approach that should become more widely adopted? The bathrooms, kitchen, and floors still need to be installed. But that is factored into the price and allows you to furnish it in your style, not someone else's.
Turn-key properties are great, if they’ve been decorated to your taste. But sometimes developers opt for basic finishes that you might end up getting rid of in favour of something more suited to your style.
Take flooring, for instance. You may not like the basic grey laminate that has been laid throughout. But it lures you in the front door. As soon as you move in and get to grips with mortgage payments, you decide that you don’t want to live with it. This means you remove perfectly functional flooring that most likely will end up in a skip and in landfill.
Address: 13 Knocknahorgan Cottages, Sallybrook, Glanmire, Cork, Glanmire, Co. Cork No Eircode yet
Asking price: €345,000
Agent: AML Property Services
One builder in Glanmire has taken what could be considered a more ecological approach. He took an uninhabited terraced cottage, so derelict that it still doesn’t have an Eircode, and rehabilitated it, undertaking all the ugly, dirty work so you don’t have to. In doing so, he has brought it up to an A BER rating.
When you open the front door of number 13 Knocknahorgan Cottages, a double-fronted, dormer cottage in Sallybrook, instead of a pristine interior and the smell of fresh paint, you will be greeted by a bare concrete shell.
This house still needs bathrooms, a kitchen, tiling, flooring, and a paint job. A bathroom is essential, but for all the other finishes, you could take a view that you could camp out in the house while you get the money together for each.
Many of the savviest homeowners do this. Eoghan and Sarah O’Donnell, who are currently selling their three-bedroom house in Galway city, spent 233 days in it without a kitchen, cooking on a camp stove and ordering Deliveroo as they got to grips with finding the money to complete the now walk-in condition property.
WThishouse lets you focus on the fun parts: finding furniture and furnishings you will see and use every day to create a home that speaks to you.
Number 13 is laid out as a decent-sized, three-bedroom, two-bathroom, two-storey property.
It has a small sitting room at the front, to the left of the hall. The first of its three bedrooms is on the other side, also front-facing. The main bathroom is to the back of the bedroom.
The kitchen overlooks the terraced garden and spans the width of the house. Off it is a utility room.
The most practical approach would be to work on getting the ground floor done first, starting with the bathroom and bedroom and then progressing to the kitchen.
Upstairs, there are two bedrooms, one of which is ensuite. This could be part of phase two.
The west-facing garden is a real feature. In renovations, the garden is usually the last piece of the property to be addressed. That can mean looking out at builder’s rubble for months, or even years, after you move in.
But here you’re looking at an Italianate style terraced garden laid out over several levels. It features natural stone walls, winding steps and a series of private outdoor spaces. The ground needs to be seeded for grass and filled with specimen plants, but much of the back-breaking work has been done here.
More steps lead to a private patio area, ideal for outdoor dining, and at the top of the steps, elevated above the house, is another patio area and wood-clad garden room, which has already been plumbed. With views over the house to the local GAA pitch, it will make a compelling home office or studio.
A lot of people want something different, says selling agent Aine McLoughlin. “They want the big, dirty jobs done and to be able to put their own stamp on it.”
Agents AML Property Services is seeking €345,000 for the house, which measures 103 square metres.
Cork city centre is about a 15-minute drive.
