Glenveagh acquires two sites with plans for over 400 homes

Move brings capacity of the Irish housebuilder’s landbank up to over 5,000 units

Irish listed housebuilder Glenveagh Properties said on Monday it was to acquire two new sites with the capacity for almost 400 homes. The move brings the scale of the company’s landbank up to more than 5,000 units.

The property company, which raised more than €500 million when it listed on the Irish Stock Exchange in October, is to acquire a development site at Citywest Road, Dublin 24, close to the Fortunestown Luas stop and to Citywest Shopping Centre. The site can deliver 195 residential units, subject to planning. Glenveagh has also signed an unconditional legal contract to acquire a 162-acre site in Hollystown, Dublin 15, currently occupied by Hollystown Golf Club, with the scope to deliver 200 family homes between 2019 and 2023, subject to planning. Investec estimates that Glenveagh will have paid about €25-€30 million for the sites.

Chief executive Justin Bickle said: "We are delighted with today's two new land acquisitions. Our growing landbank now has capacity, subject to planning, for over 5,000 units, at an average cost of €61,000 per unit, deploying over €178 million of the proceeds of the IPO. We are very excited about our momentum since the IPO was completed."

North Docklands

Glenveagh has also completed the acquisition, first announced in December, of the two-hectare site in Dublin’s north Docklands known locally as East Road. The housebuilder has plans to deliver more than 450 residential units on the site.

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Glenveagh was created through the combination of assets of US private equity firm Oaktree Capital and Maynooth-based builder Bridgedale. Some 40 per cent of the landbank for its 5,000 units is located in Dublin. It has set itself a target of building 1,000 new homes a year by 2020, rising to 2,000 over the longer term.

Fiona Reddan

Fiona Reddan

Fiona Reddan is a writer specialising in personal finance and is the Home & Design Editor of The Irish Times