The Garda Commissioner, Mr Pat Byrne, bought a house which needed much work and the price of £90,000 he paid in 1994 was fair, an auctioneer who had the house on his books said yesterday.
Mr Ronald Duff of Ronald Duff & Associates, Fairyhouse, Ratoath, Co Meath, said the house could not have been called a mansion in 1994 when Mr Byrne bought it, but it could now, after the work that had been done.
The price would have been in or around £90,000 in 1994 but Mr Byrne would have had to have spent an awful lot more on it to make it what it was today.
The house in Greenogue, Kilsallaghan, Co Meath, had been on the market with his company but in fact, he said, he did not sell it; it was sold privately. Before the sale, it had been rented out for some time. It was on the market for two years before it was sold and by that time was in disrepair.
Mr Duff said the house had not had seven bedrooms. It started as a standard four to five-bedroom detached house and extra bedrooms were added from a garage conversion and from part of a utility room.
It had also been reported the house had 18 rooms altogether. "That is a gross exaggeration. It is not an 18-roomed house," he said.
The house looked enormous from the road because it was on a high, elevated site, but it was not palatial. It could be called a mansion now but it was still standard for that type of house.
At one time, the house stood on six acres but now it was on about one acre, he said.
Mr Duff's company was one of two which had the house on the market.