Private investors may be interested in the opportunity presented by the sale of number 16 Clare Street in Dublin’s south city centre. Known to generations of Dubliners and visitors alike as the long-standing former premises of Greene’s Bookshop, which first operated as a lending library in 1843 and then as a bookseller until 2007, today the building is home to the well-known garden designers and horticulturists Howbert and Mays. Number 16 Clare Street is being offered to the market by agent BDM Property at a guide price of €1.45 million.
The property, near the junction with Merrion Square West, and within a short walk of the National Gallery of Ireland, Trinity College and Government Buildings, comprises a four-storey over-basement building of 297sq m (3,197sq ft) with 11m of frontage on to Clare Street. The building dates originally from 1765 according to the National Built Heritage Service (NBHS).
The entire building is producing €75,000 in annual rental income with a small vacant second floor office and a recently vacated third-floor one-bedroom apartment. The outgoing tenant had been paying €26,000 in rent per year. The ground and first floors are occupied by Howbert and Mays with the entire second floor given over to office use.
The selling agent expects that the building’s overall rental income can be increased to about €110,000 a year once the two vacant elements of the building are tenanted, with €26,000 from the apartment and about €9,000 from the vacant office space. A rental income of €110,000 would provide the new owner with a return of 6.9 per cent on their investment.
Cathal Kelly of BDM Property says: “Trophy assets like this, with its good frontage, high-profile location and the ability to significantly increase the rent roll, really offers an attractive prospect for investors.”
