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The Louth GAA club raffling off a four-bed house: 5 things to know in property this week
Plus, UTV’s Northern Ireland HQ is up for sale.
Each week, we put together a five-minute roundup of the week’s biggest property stories – the sector moves fast, and sometimes it can be hard to keep up.
This week, Termonfeckin GAA club is running a very unusual contest, and Kildare is set to get 450 new homes.
1) A four-bed home could be yours for €100
Feeling lucky? A GAA club in Co Louth is raffling off a beachside four bed in Termonfeckin in an effort to raise funds for a new community centre. St Fechin’s GAA Club have secured the home – in the Castle Park development – with the help of a local developer.
8,000 tickets are available for the raffle, and they’re priced at €100 each. Other prizes include a bathroom makeover, 2 nights in Barcelona, and a Mediterranean cruise.
2) UTV’s Belfast HQ is up for sale – check out the photos
Havelock House has been home to Northern Ireland’s largest commercial television broadcaster, UTV, for almost 60 years. With the station moving to a newer Belfast home, the premises is on sale for £3.5m (€4m) via Savills.
For many years, UTV’s base at Havelock House was also used by television film crews around the world to process and edit film footage of the Troubles. Check out some photos of the studio here.
3) Ireland needs three times as many new builds as it has, says economist
The latest figures from Goodbody Stockbrockers have shown that 2,367 homes have been built in the first three months of 2018 – but we’re still way behind where we need to be.
As reported in the Irish Independent, Goodbody economist Dermot O’Leary estimates that “more than a trebling of output is still required from here to catch up with estimated annual demand”. The figure puts Ireland way behind most European countries in terms of new builds, with only Portugal, Italy and Spain building less.
4) 450 new homes to be built in Leixlip, Co Kildare
The Strategic Housing Development Scheme has fast-tracked planning permission for 450 homes to be built in Leixlip, on the Dublin-Kildare border. The development will be constructed by Ardstone Homes and will open up over 30 acres of land around the local curiosity known as the Wonderful Barn.
The development is on track to open in 2019; Ardstone’s managing director Stephen Cassidy welcomed the fast-track legislation for giving the group “the opportunity to rapidly deliver 450 new homes”.
5) Smyths pays €80m to buy dozens of Toys R Us outlets
Irish toy giant Smyths has made its first forays into Europe, snapping up dozens of former Toys R Us stores in Germany, Austria and Switzerland. Toys R Us went bankrupt last year, and the sale cost Smyths €79 million.
Smyths intends to rename the outlets, adding a number of European properties to the 100 it operates in Ireland and the UK, and boosting the company’s annual revenue to over one billion euro.
And finally, this week’s property buzzword…
We’re breaking down the complicated world of property jargon, one buzzword at a time. This week, it’s a Jack and Jill bathroom, a design feature you’ll spot in one of this week’s 4 of a kind properties. Sometimes called a connected bathroom, it is usually situated between two separate bedrooms – though in some cases it’s simply a bathroom with two wash hand basins.
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