Daft Property - Irish Property News

Homes beside Google down 65% from peak... Over 800 people on list for 26 apartments and houses beside Google HQ with prices starting at €155,000 APARTMENTS and townhouses beside Google’s headquarters in Barrow Street, Dublin 4, go on sale today with prices starting at €155,000 – down an average 65.5 per cent from their peak values in 2006. Twenty of the Liam Carroll-built apartments along with six townhouses in the popular development are being sold by receiver Grant Thorton through sales agents HT Meagher O’Reilly New Homes. In an unusual move, Ulster Bank which financed Liam Carroll to build the development, is to offer mortgages for the purchase of the units, and will consider applications from investors as well as owner occupiers. Until now banks have been refusing mortgages to investors. However, David Browne of HT Meagher O’Reilly expects the units to sell mainly to cash buyers. The agency already has a database of over 800 potential buyers for the one, two and three-

The times, they are uncertain... The past year was characterised by harsh economic truths and a grinding dilution of hope, especially for people on the margins of society and those who saw their lifestyles – and livelihoods – dissolve IT WAS the year of uncertainty. Of waiting, and waiting, and dreading. The dominos of society collapsed one by one – the see-no-evil bishops and priests, the senior gardaí who colluded with them, the invincible developers, swaggering bankers, procrastinating judges, grasping politicians, language itself – and trust fell off a cliff. More than two out of three people declared they trusted no-one, in a monthly poll on the mood of the nation. Loss of trust was a theme of the year, says Carolyn Odgers of Chemistry Advertising, which commissioned the poll from Amárach Research. It was confirmed by The Irish Times /Behaviour Attitudes social survey last month . Only three in 100 will be bothered to look more closely at Government and in the event of another rec

The blame game for the boom is well underway, says Isabel Morton... LAST SEPTEMBER, I rather boldly suggested that we might all consider suing the banks. I am now interested to hear that it is to come to pass. Investors are planning to sue Anglo Irish Bank. Given what we now know about the specific circumstances of that particular bank, it is understandable that investors, who lost a lot of money, are now somewhat sore about it all. However, the idea that property developers are also considering suing Anglo Irish Bank is not quite as easy to fathom, particularly as they are suing based on the grounds that the bank behaved negligently by breaching the guidelines of sensible lending practices. My initial reaction to this news was: that the property developers have some nerve; and that they hadn’t a hope in hell of succeeding. But, having thought about the basis of their argument, I could see that the same argument might actually be applicable to many of the loans and mortgages obtained b