Plot for sale in Dublin. Is this a crazy idea?

pipelaser

I recently have been giving thought to buy a plot of land in dublin city centre for sale for 350,000.

• The site has two derelict terraced houses in it. If restored(Or would prob have to be knocked and built from scratch).They would fetch at least 500,000 each(very good location), even in todays market.
• I was thinking i could buy the site through a mortgage. After which point i would have no more funds left for the project, but i could perhaps do a deal to give one house to an investor or developer(who would build both houses) in return for one of the houses when both are complete.
• So in effect the developer would only be paying for the cost of building the two houses.

Does this sound like a good plan to anyone?? Or am i completely mad?

connundrum

Sounds like an excellent plan. Now if only we could find a developer...

antoinolachtnai

The problem coulbe simply be that there is no market for houses at the moment, so no one wants to get involved in it. The bank would be slow to give you a mortgage, i'd imagine, if you don't have development experience.

It does sound like a great price.

You would want to be sure there weren't title issues.

Also, it is worth checking if the property is a protected structure. If it is, then you won't be allowed demolish it (you need planning permission to demolish any habitable house in any case, I think).

The demolition could turn out to be quite 'technical'. The properties could be supporting other houses on the terrace.

There are people who spend all their days scouting around for deals like this and very little goes unnoticed in the city centre. I'm inclined to think there's a 'gotcha' somewhere, but there might not be.

stevoman

if you have the money buy it and just sit on it (not literaly)

ZYX

While it does not sound possible if you are unable to get finance, the first question you need to ask is how much would it cost you to build 2 houses on this site? Obviously costs would have to be below €250,000 at least per house. Do you have enough experience to do this?

TommyT

If it was so easy a developer would have done it already.

BendiBus

Leaving aside minor issues such as collapsing property prices & confidence, rising unemployment, and the reluctanct of banks to lend for sugh a project...

As I'm not a builder, If I had the cash I'd buy the site, engage a good architect to design a redevelopment of the site, squeezing maximum floorspace onto it, get planning permission and sell it on at a handsome profit. Easy peasy.

Show_me_Safety

be careful if your developing for the first time...sarah beaney won't be there to help.
i think sitting on it is a great idea!

realease equity in it when the market starts to pick up, when the place is finished there may be more confidence in the marker than there is now and you could earn a greater profit!

BendiBus

Oh, and only offer €250K for it.

silverside

leave it to the experts... if it was such a bargain someone else would do it - the market still seems to be falling so i would steer clear of anything property related unless I was certain I knew what I was doing.

In a rising market (like 5 years ago) one could get away with learning as you go - but not now .

tedstriker

Don't. You will not be able to sell the houses for the price you think you might. It is not 2 or 3 years ago.