Views to a killing with the right plans and a good architect

A house with a view of Dalkey Island near the foot of Coliemore Road in Dalkey, Co Dublin, is for sale for €1.25 million – but it's the site and its potential rather than Bella Vista, the detached bungalow, that's likely to draw buyers.

Its owner, Anna Bateman, says that if she had the cash, she herself would pull down the cold, damp three-bed, built in 1932, and build again.

“My only sentimental attachment is to the view,” she says of the house her parents bought in 1959.

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She spent a childhood playing in Dillon’s Park by the sea across the road or at Coliemore Harbour a short walk away, where she still keeps a boat.

As it is, accommodation in the 65sq m (700sq ft) house consists of a lounge, kitchen, three bedrooms and a bathroom in need of total modernisation, standing on a site of 0.16 acres.

It has a 125ft long, very steep back garden that backs on to Sorrento Park.

Bateman says she used to climb up here with a flask of tea and cigarettes to watch the sun rise over Dalkey Sound, the stretch of water between the park opposite Bella Vista and Dalkey Island.

It’s a pretty spectacular location, so it’s not surprising that Bateman has apparently received up to 30 letters a year from people interested in buying her home.

Agent Vincent Finnegan suggests a buyer is most likely to be someone with cash who might build a luxury modern house that would take full advantage of the site’s sea views.

Dalkey architect Johnny Bennett says it could cost from €750,000 to €1 million to build a 316sq m (3,400sq ft) house on the site – and up to €1.5 million for a house with a very high-end finish.

He believes that planning permission is likely to be granted, as this stretch of Coliemore “is one of the rare bits of Dalkey that’s not protected.

It is a heritage town, but the planners are not likely to object”.

Example

An example of what could be created is just two doors away on Coliemore Road, where a semi-detached house that sold for €685,000 in 2012, was demolished and rebuilt by Bennett and his firm, Extend.

They built a four-storey 223sq m (2,400sq ft) house designed so that the back can be seen from the front.

The new house has a basement and a separate studio at the top of the steep terraced garden at the back, which looks over the roof of the new house.

It was built in 2013 for between €500,000 and €550,000 “when building costs were lower”, says Bennett.

Coliemore, the road that winds down from Dalkey past Coliemore Harbour, ending at Sorrento Terrace, is in one of the capital’s starriest suburbs.

Residents living nearby include film directors Neil Jordan and, for a while, Jim Sheridan, who sold his troubled starchitect-designed house near the harbour – once valued at €10 million in 2008 – for €2.3 million at the end of 2015.

Vincent Browne – a good neighbour, says Bateman – sold his Victorian home nearly across the road from Bella Vista for €2.6 million in 2011.