Developer Johnny Ronan’s Ronan Group Real Estate (RGRE) looks set to deepen its involvement in the supply of housing to the Dublin market.
Having forged a reputation for large-scale office projects in the capital, RGRE has appointed Gavin Wyley as head of residential. Wyley previously served as managing director of UK property company Dandara’s housebuilding and commercial development business in Scotland, where he was led the delivery of 1,600 residential units and 550,000sq ft of commercial space during the past decade.
That included Scotland’s first institutionally forward-funded build-to-rent scheme which was sold to LaSalle Investment Managers in 2016. While RGRE’s current focus is on the completion of new European headquarters office campuses for Salesforce in the Dublin docklands and Facebook in Ballsbridge, its land bank in the city centre and south Dublin has the capacity to accommodate more than 5,500 residential units. That figure does not include the 3,500 units on the former Irish Glass Bottle site, the purchase of which RGRE expects to complete this month.
Commenting on his appointment as head of residential at RGRE, Wyley said: “My role is both to deliver on the current pipeline and to pursue new residential opportunities to supplement our existing land bank. I’m very aware of the structural shortfall in the Dublin residential market – this is a supply-side challenge we’re ready to meet. I’m also aware in coming here of both the quality of the land bank and the ambition within RGRE to become a market leader in the residential space.”
While Wyley would not be drawn on the status of joint-venture or funding discussions with institutional partners, he said: “Nothing is off the table. We can look at each site on a standalone basis but clearly there is scale here to do something significant.”
RGRE chief executive Rory Williams said: “I’m delighted to welcome Gavin to the team. His deep expertise in delivering high-quality residential build-to-sell and build-to-rent at scale perfectly complements our ambitions.”
