Number 225 Kingsbery is a 20year-old detached three-bed house in good condition on one of the mature estates in Maynooth, the Kildare town with a population of about 8,000 just 15 miles from Dublin. The house, which has a very attractive small, brick-walled conservatory off the kitchen and diningroom, is for sale by private treaty for £120,000 through Coonan estate agents.
The house is long rather than wide, with a livingroom opening off the front hall. The livingroom opens through glazed doors into the diningroom, and through patio doors into the conservatory. There is room for eating in the oak-unit fitted kitchen, with an attractive brick shed in the garden plumbed for utilities. Upstairs is a fully-tiled bathroom, two double bedrooms and and a single. The house stands next to an open field which is likely to be built on in the future. There is space for a garage next to the house, and a neat and private back garden to the rear.
Although the cost of houses in Maynooth is very much influenced by Dublin prices, there is good value to be found here for first-time buyers. Number 22 Beaufield Avenue, a two-bed townhouse in a small cul-de-sac, is a neat house in an estate built about 10 years ago off the Rathcoffey Road, not far from Maynooth College. It is for sale through Gerard Brady & Company for around £85,000.
The house, which new owners would probably redecorate, has a tiled hall and livingroom, a kitchen/breakfastroom, a small private rear garden with a Barna shed, and upstairs, two double bedrooms. There is offstreet car-parking at the front in this quiet cul-de-sac. The 120-house estate has lots of green space, and a neighbourhood shopping centre.
Maynooth is an attractive prospect for first-time buyers. The university town has been a satellite of Dublin since the 1970s, when the first suburban houses were built here. It is fairly readily accessible by bus
and rail (a journey of around 45 minutes), and a 25/30-minute drive (outside of rush hour) along the M4 motorway to Dublin's city centre. The new Liffey Valley shopping centre at the junction of the M4 and the M50 is a short drive away - and not much further is Blanchardstown shopping centre. It has the appeal of an established community which you don't get, say, in the sprawling suburbia of nearby Lucan South. The suburbs of Maynooth are all pretty much within walking distance of the town's wide main street, which runs straight down from the edge of the Carton Demesne to the entrance to Maynooth College. Most are well-designed, with noticeably wide streets, and plenty of open green spaces.
If there is a problem, it is the relatively limited supply of housing in the town. Auctioneer and Kildare county councillor Gerry Brady estimates that some 1,000 houses were built in the town in the 1970s, in response both to demand from Dublin city, and to meet the demands of the college, which had just opened its doors to lay men and women. Lack of serviced land pretty much halted building until the late 1980s and early 1990s; since then, around 800 or so new houses have been built in the town. Many of these have tended to be upmarket, in estates like Rockfield, with prices of around £135,000 for four-beds - too expensive for most first-time buyers, although pretty good value, compared, say, to similar houses in south county Dublin.
BUT it seems likely that there will be major house-building in the area in the next five to 10 years, although there is considerable opposition to rezoning land for building. Rezoning in Kildare was stopped by central government two years ago, pending adoption of a plan for the county. Now the draft county plan is on public display until early this month, and likely to be adopted by next spring. After this, plans for individual towns can be made.
Logic suggests that Maynooth should be developed - millions of pounds are to be spent on upgrading the western suburban rail link, building a double track where there is only a single track now, and including Kilcock in the service; There is continued need for student accommodation as the university grows, not to mention demand from nearby computer firms Intel and Hewlett Packard, just a few miles down the old Dublin road in Leixlip. (Until they opened, Maynooth college was one of biggest employers in Co Kildare, says Gerry Brady.)
As things stand, the most affordable homes for first-time buyers are those built 10 to 20 years ago, which can range in price from around £85,000 up to £120,000 for one as good as the detached house at 225 Kingsbery on the 300-house estate. Unsurprisingly, there is a greater percentage of investor-owned student housing on the older and less expensive estates. Investors have always been an important part of the market for housing in Maynooth, with or without tax incentives - although agent Sue Tuite, of Coonan's estate agents, says that the restrictions implemented following the Bacon Report did, at least for a while, kill investor interest in the market. But come September, there was a scramble by quite a few parents of students in Maynooth to buy student housing, because of the great shortage of accommodation, according to Brenda Colgan, of Matt Bruton & Associates estate agents.
Gerry Brady says three-bed semis are the most popular house type for investors, with most of the more expensive new housing being bought by owner-occupiers. Standard student rents in the town are £35 a week, with most landlords fitting about five students into a three-bed semi. Around half the growing student population of about 5,500 needs accommodation locally (the rest commute, mainly from Dublin).
There are some eight apartment developments around the town, with prices averaging about £100,000 for a two-bed, and rents about £520 per month - and plenty of demand, especially for schemes like Harbour View, next door to the Glen Royal Hotel and leisure complex, and just across the road from the train station, which is beside the attractively landscaped canal. (One of the suprises of the train journey to Maynooth is how pretty it is - it runs for most of the way beside the Royal Canal). And there are a handful of artisan houses and cottages on the streets off the main street, which cost an estimated £70,000 to £100,000, depending on condition - but they don't come on to the market very often.
THERE are quite a few plans for the town which ensure it will go on being a lively place in the future. The fairly recently-built Glen Royal Hotel and the leisure complex have been hugely successful, says Gerry Brady. A new hotel, Dowestown Hotel, is being built on the Straffan side of the motorway. Kavanaghs, the family which owns the long-established cattle-feed mill next to the college, just off the main street, has ambitious plans to develop its five-acre site with a mix of apartments, hotels, shopping facilities and a science park, integrated into the college and the town. Planning application has been sought, and if approved, the mill would be moved out of town to a greenfield site.
The OPW is involved in plans to restore Maynooth Castle, the ruins of the Geraldine castle at the front gates of the college - like Carton, it was owned by the FitzGerald family, defended by people like "Silken Thomas" FitzGerald, which is presumably where the nearby prettily-named Silken Vale housing estate got its name.
There is also talk of ring roads to alleviate traffic congestion. Although the M4 took heavy traffic for the west out of Maynooth four years ago, there are still regular traffic jams, especially when the town's two primary schools and its co-ed community school close in the afternoon.
The main remaining question mark about Maynooth is the future of the Carton Demesne. The lime tree walk, which is open to the public, starts at the end of the main street, next to the local girls' primary school. But it is unkempt and overgrown. Ambitious plans for development of a hotel, golf courses, an equestrian centre and luxury housing on its 1,100 acres have so far come to nought.
