AroundtheBlock
Cash will be king in the months to come if the market continues to stagnate. Anyone with a million or two in the bank is in a strong bargaining position when it comes up to buying both second-hand houses and new homes.

Trading up has virtually ceased, largely because of higher interest rates and the great uncertainty over stamp duty thanks to the PDs and Fine Gael. With so much economic doom and gloom around - much of it unwarranted - it has become harder to sell at every level of the market.

This is especially true in the new homes market where agents are losing as many sales as they are completing. First-time buyers who have dominated the market in recent years are looking twice at what's on offer, and many are holding back in the expectation that prices could fall further. Again, anyone with hard cash to spend could do well in the coming months, as agents find ways of packaging properties suitable for letting. These type of deals are appealing to hardened investors who see a buoyant rental market continuing to roll. Their tenants will include many people who would have thought about buying in a different climate. Builders, meanwhile, may decide to take a break from housing sites and improve their golf handicap rather than continue building product that is not moving. It's a different ballgame for those involved in apartment schemes where units have been sold off plans and so the entire scheme has to be completed. Builders with several teams building simultaneously on large sites across Dublin and beyond will inevitably close down their operation in the coming months because of the fall off in sales. The Polish flights home will be full unless some good news starts feeding through this election year.

Mains matter in D6W

What's going in at College Square, Ballymore's swanky new development in Terenure? Residents of the leafy streets of Dublin 6W are wondering when the new neighbours are going to move in but still there is no sign of life behind the gates. The problem is a small matter of sewerage and the fact that the houses are not connected to the mains. This is going to happen, though it will mean closing down Wainsfort Road for a few days - a costly exercise. The scheme was a virtual sell-out last September, though since then some of the sales have fallen through, because the vast majority of buyers were trading up from the surrounding areas and were not able to sell their own homes.

Warming to the climate

Time was when Irish builders knew how to protect properties against the weather - hence solid stone cottages nestled into the landscape with their backs to the wind. Windows were necessarily small because glass was expensive and conducted the cold. Later, when fires came at the flick of a switch and energy was cheap, we abandoned such sensible sun-catching design and plonked badly insulated homes on high ground and built towns that sucked gales through wind-tunnel-effect streets. Once again we are learning how to stay warm naturally by catching the sun through south-facing insulated glass and building solid walls on north-facing elevations. The Arts Council is now promoting such wind-proofing by giving an award to Mullingar-born, Dublin and US-educated architect Stephen Roe for a research project called Ailtreacht, I gceann na haimsire - Architecture, immersed in the weather. The Kevin Kieran Award gives a research grant of no less than €50,000 to produce a publication on building in, and with, the Irish climate. The lucky architect will then be commissioned to design a building for the OPW.

Walk to run in April

Sherry FitzGerald is keen to get people moving and it's not just moving house. The Sherry FitzGerald Walkathon in aid of Temple Street Children's Hospital aims to be Ireland's largest charity walk with simultaneous 10kms walks taking place in Dublin, Cork, Galway and Limerick on Sunday, April 29th. The event will raise funds for the renovation and conversion of a house on Fontenoy Street in Dublin 7 for use as parent's accommodation. The initiative was launched in 2006 by Sherry FitzGerald to assist Temple Street Children's Hospital in purchasing the house.

For more information contact the Walkathon hotline on 01-6399661 or email walkathon@sherryfitz.ie.