People working in or near Dublin still face tough choices if they want to buy their first house in the first year of the 21st century. With a few exceptions, people with little more than £100,000 to spend will have to choose between buying a "commuter home" in a country town up to 50 miles outside the capital, or buying a small city centre apartment or a former local authority house in a not-so-popular area of the city.
But it is worth looking hard at west Dublin - Blanchardstown, Huntstown, Hartstown, Clonsilla, Lucan - before deciding to head for hills. Three-bed semidetached houses built around 15 years ago are selling for between £100,000 and £115,000; more-recently built houses with modern features, such as en suite bathrooms, can be bought for £120,000-plus.
A second-hand house in one of the sprawling west Dublin suburbs may not be many first-time buyers' dream home - but it could beat long-distance commuting. West Dublin is pretty much the least expensive new homes area in the city - but the basic price of a new three-bed semi there is now 130,000-plus, and agents say that even apartments and two-bed townhouses will be priced around that level. (One exception to this is a recently-launched new homes scheme near Clondalkin village, Castlegrange, where prices of three-bed mid-terraced houses start from £99,500.)
The good news for first-time buyers that house-building is to increase substantially in the next year or two is tempered by economists' forecasts that house prices will rise by 15 to 20 per cent in 2000 - with secondhand prices rising faster than the price of new homes. It seems it will be at least two years before the supply of new houses will even begin to mop up demand.
Dublin's first-time buyers, of course, fall into at least two distinct categories: those whose absolute priority is to live as close as possible to the city centre, who confine their house-hunting to looking mainly at secondhand houses in an inner city ring running roughly from the East Wall, Fairview, Cabra and Stoneybatter on the northside, over to the Liberties, Rialto, Crumlin, Inchicore, and now Ballyfermot on the southside. Prices in this market range from about £100,000 for a two-bed needing serious refurbishment up to £140,000/£150,000 in still-popular Stoneybatter.
The other - and it seems stronger - trend is for first-time buyers to house-hunt in country towns in a 50-mile radius of Dublin.
The first-time buyer in 2000 is likely to be part of a couple, even a group of friends buying jointly, for high prices are squeezing all but the most well-to-do single first-time buyer out of the market.
It's not hard to see why new house-hunters are heading out of town. Leahy Property Consultants, for example, has 15 (of a total of 70) houses left for sale in Clane View, Edenderry, costing £100,000 for a three-bed, and £110,000 for a fourbed. Gunne has two-bedroom and three-bedroom apartments and townhouses in Boyne Meadow, in walking distance of Drogheda town centre, for sale from £100,000. The Ross McParland agency has 30 new homes left in Hazelwood, a scheme in Gorey, where three-bed semis cost £107,950. That's around the same price as three-bed semis in Lakepoint Park, Mullingar: there are still about seven three-bed semis left for sale from £107,500 in the first phase of this recently-launched scheme. There are also four-beds left costing from £122,500.
If you're willing to travel an extra 30 miles to Longford town, you'll get even better value: new three-bed semis can be bought there for £80,000 to £90,000 - and carry substantial tax relief against income under the Rural Renewal Scheme, which covers all Co Longford and Co Leitrim as well as parts of Roscommon, Sligo and Cavan. Under the scheme, buyers can claim 50 per cent of building costs as a tax free allowance against all income for 10 years.
Jonathan Quinn of Quinn Brothers in Longford says there has been a big surge in interest in the scheme in the past few months.
Meanwhile, if you're willing to look at second-hand houses in country towns, you could find a really good value first home. In Mullingar, for example, a 15 to 25-year-old three-bed semi will cost on average between £89,000 to £100,000.
Obviously, you will have to add in transport costs when considering whether or not to go to the country for your first home - but thousands of people have already started to turn country towns into Dublin suburbs.
Interestingly, both Marian Finnegan, economist with Sherry FitzGerald, and Clodagh Memery, head of research and policy with housing advice agency Threshold, point north to the Border if you want to go all the way and relocate yourself to a less expensive housing area. Peace may well bring more job opportunities to the Border counties, and properties on both sides of the Border are undervalued, says Ms Finnegan. Ms Memery points out that you can still get a house in Monaghan for around £60,000.
If "commuter homes" have no appeal for you, you might opt for a small city centre apartment: there is usually a reasonable supply of second-hand one-bed apartments around Gardiner Street, Mountjoy Square and along the city quays which cost between £100,000 and £120,000, says Ken MacDonald of Hooke & MacDonald. And the trend, he says "is that you'll see a lot more apartments being built in suburban locations such as Lucan, Swords and Blanchardstown", although these will likely cost from £130,000.
People looking for former local authority houses/artisan dwellings in a three-mile radius of the city centre will find that house prices both northside and southside start at around £100,000 and go up to around £140,000 for refurbished homes in areas considered "desirable" - the Phibsboro side of Cabra, for example, or Walkinstown. Houses in Stoneybatter have, all agree, "gone ballistic" in the last six months, with some refurbished two up/two down Coronation Street-style homes making £150,000 and over.
Charles White of the Herman White agency, which sells a lot of houses at the Cork Street/Rialto end of the South Circular Road, reports that he sold a "shell" of an artisan cottage in Cameron Street, close to a large flats complex, for £110,000 recently. Houses in the area off Marrowbone Lane called Maryland - a self-contained neighbourhood of 1930s former local authority homes - can be bought for around £100,000, but similar homes in not-far-away Rialto can make up to £150,000.
Meanwhile, Shane Desmond of Mason Estates's Ranelagh office reports that you can buy an ex-local authority house in Crumlin or Drimnagh for around £100,000 - but this will be a two-bed needing about £20,000 worth of complete refurbishment. Refurbished two-beds sell for £115,000 to £120,000, while refurbished three-beds can make £130,000/£140,000. A house in Walkinstown can cost up to £10,000 more.
Meanwhile, Ballyfermot may become the next area to be targeted by young professionals looking for a home not too far out of town: you can still buy a house here for £85,000 to £90,000.
