Perhaps the cheapest house in Ireland, but it comes with a catch
For those seeking splendid isolation, you can’t get more remote than the townland of Glensharrold, about 1.5 kilometres outside the village of Carrigkerry, in west Limerick.
On the edge of a forested bothareen, at a crossroads, is a 200-year-old detached thatched cottage that has been in the same family since it was built by the great, great granddad of 94-year-old owner Patrick O’Connell.
The three-bay, three-bedroom, one-bathroom house, with its stepped reed thatch roof, is a snapshot of a bygone Ireland. O’Connell recalls doing his homework by paraffin lamp before rural electrification in 1948.
“I wonder how we didn’t lose our eyesight,” he says. There was no running water either.
Despite the basic conditions, he returned to the house every summer after he went to live in England in his early 20s, where he welded cars for Austin.
The connection continued with O’Connell’s eldest son even born in the house.
The house was last thatched a decade ago by Richard O’Riordan, who had done another in the area, and the family returned every summer for long periods until Covid, when travel became impossible.
Maintaining it from afar has become difficult for Patrick and his family, and it is with a heavy heart that he has put it on the market.
“My great, great granddad built this house. It goes back a long way. I thought long and hard about whether to sell it, but upkeep is difficult.”
It’s the kind of property presenter Maggie Molloy, of TV show Cheap Irish Homes, would wax lyrical about the original features it has aplenty inside.
But it is in need of some serious TLC.
It opens into a pitched-roofed living room cum kitchen with brown ironstone plates still hanging on the chimney breast above the tiled area accommodating the range cooker.
Much of the furniture is still in situ. For example, there’s a traditional dresser on the opposite wall.
There are rooms on either side. Both have v-groove panelled ceilings that, if salvageable, would help link any new look to its past.
There is also good volume in the ceilings above, which, if pitched as per the sitting room, would make the place feel more spacious.
The rooms have deep-set windows, and the bedrooms are situated to the rear, in a stone-built extension with a slated roof that was built by Patrick’s wife’s father.
It has been there as long as Patrick can remember.
The property, which has a G BER rating, extends to 58 square metres, and is being auctioned on DNG’s online bidding platform by DNG Declan Woulfe on September 4th at 11am.
The residence requires extensive renovation. It is also listed on the record of protected structures in the Newcastle West Municipal District.
The agents understand this house may be eligible for the vacant property refurbishment grant to refurbish derelict one-off rural houses for anyone who will occupy it as their principal private residence.
Set on just over three-quarters of an acre, the property also comes with a cow shed and hen house that, if renovated, could be used as home offices.
The property is a 10-kilometre drive to the county town Newcastlewest.
As for the catch, any prospective purchaser will have to bore their own private well water supply for this property.
