Clondalkin for first time buyer

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I'm looking for 3 bed house/apartment to buy (first time buyer). My budget is in around €320K. I work in Blackrock. From Propertynews and Daft, it looks like houses in Clondalkin is within my budget and near to Blackrock.
1) Is Clondalkin is safe place to live
2) Any good primary schools around Clondalkin
3) Is it easy to commute by bus to Blackrock
 
Hi

1) It depends what part of Clondalkin you go for. There are good and bad parts in every area obviously. A good area for a first time buyer withi your price range would be Cherrywood. Although there are a good few houses rented out (thats what happens when houses are cheaper, investors are attracted to them for that reason and then they rent them out) but its a nice estate and you would probably get a house there at the moment for around €300 - 310k. I've seen one there for 295k recently!. A few more estates that spring to mind - St. Johns Wood, Oakwood (a bit more expensive) and Palmerstown Woods - thinking about it now, this is probably even better than Cherrywood - reasonably priced houses in a good estate and is 5 mins walk from the trainstation which will get you into town in 7 mins.
2)Someone else might be able to help you out better here - I don;t know much about what the schools are like these days.

3) Theres no direct bus that goes to Blackrock from Clondalkin directly - it'd be a some bus if it did!. But I mentioned the train that will take you from Clondalkin to Hueston in 7 mins. Theres also a new bus service which is excellent - the 151. Takes you into town in around 30 mins. Maybe you could make your way to Blackrock from town then??.

Hope that helps a little bit. Can i ask, what is making you move to Clondalkin? Not expecting you to buy in Blackrock for 300k! But is there no where even a little nearer to your work thats within your budget?. Just thinking of quality of life - I mean it could be a long commute for ya every day.

2)
 
Thank you for your useful advice.

I would love to buy a house/apartment in Blackrock or somewhere near, if I can get 3 bed accommodation within my budget. So far. the price is more than €400K. Do you have any suggestion?
 
To answer your original question

1. yes
2. yes (but make sure you buy your house south of the canal)
3. yes ( take's about 1hr. Bus to town dart to blackrock)

Have a look at this one
[broken link removed]

It's in Bawnogue but dont let that put you off
 
Going to be blunt here but you'll thank me for it. You need your head examined if you buy in clondalkin but work in blackrock. Even if you worked in clondalkin why would you buy there - I'll be polite and say it's not the best area. Don't waste your money there if you have any sense.

Maybe around monastry road is borderline ok but the majority of clondalkin/neilstown etc is absolutely to be avoided. Don't be panicked into buying there because of your view on the constraints of what you have to spend. I'm not going to do your homework for you but please look at other areas for your budget nearer where you will be working before you settle for one of the worst parts of dublin.

If I were you I would rent a nice house nr blackrock for €1500 a month (look at daft) for a year or so and see how the market goes and build up your knowledge of what's available out there.
 
fintans, how well do you actually know Clondalkin? I know it very well, grew up there and find your analysis highly inaccurate and offensive. To say that "Maybe around monastry road is borderline ok" is both dismissing the rest of the village and making a sweeping generalisation.
 
There is good value to be had in Clondalkin, just like everywhere else good areas and bad areas. Plenty of other threads already on the board to have a look at.

I would not be prepared to commute to Blackrock from there though, would be an absolute nightmare. Has to be somewhere nearer for your budget.

People who generalise and make sweeping statements saying Clondalkin is one of the worst areas in Dublin havent got a clue what they are talking about. The monastery road "borderline ok" comment is just priceless!
 
WhoAmI said:
fintans, how well do you actually know Clondalkin? I know it very well, grew up there and find your analysis highly inaccurate and offensive. To say that "Maybe around monastry road is borderline ok" is both dismissing the rest of the village and making a sweeping generalisation.
Click to expand...


Never lived in c'dalkin but indeed I haven't lived in 99% of areas in dublin but still entitled to an opinion about it. My impression is that clondalkin is for the most part a pretty rough area that you would want to think long and hard about moving to is a pretty genuine observation that many would share. Sorry to be frank but I'd rather give someone an honest opinion than to pretend that clondalkin is an area where I would recommend someone buy a house.
 
Fintans, your impression is an insult to the majority of clondalkin people. If you have never lived here then to be honest you have to right to comment on what its like do you?


As for the OP's question, I also think it a bit strange wanting to commute between Blackrock and Clondalkin. There is no direct bus route for a start and you would be spending most of your day going from bus to train or sitting in traffic on the M50.

http://www.askaboutmoney.com/showthread.php?t=24846&highlight=clondalkin

http://www.askaboutmoney.com/showthread.php?t=63358&highlight=clondalkin
 
fintans said:
Never lived in c'dalkin but indeed I haven't lived in 99% of areas in dublin but still entitled to an opinion about it. My impression is that clondalkin is for the most part a pretty rough area that you would want to think long and hard about moving to is a pretty genuine observation that many would share. Sorry to be frank but I'd rather give someone an honest opinion than to pretend that clondalkin is an area where I would recommend someone buy a house.
Click to expand...

How can you be frank or give someone an honest opinion on something you know nothing about? If you havent lived there, then sorry you really are not able to give a frank and honest opinion. Why would you consider recommending/not recommending someone buy a house in an area you don't know? Is it not more "honest" to say, dont know the area rather than give your "honest" opinion, which is not really honest given you dont know what you are talking about.

For a start your "impression" is wrong and your thinking that you are entitled give opinions based on your impressions that you confess you know nothing about is odd, to say the least. Why would someone even think themselves qualified to give an opinion on an area they did not know?

It would be quite clear to anyone who ever lived in Clondalkin from your first post that you did not know the area at all, and the second one has just confirmed it.

It might really be more constructive if you gave your opinion about the 1% of areas in Dublin you do know something about.
 
I bought a house within a few miles from Neilstown Clondalkin in the early 90s and I often thought if only someone had given me a bit of advice I could have saved myself one of the worst purchases of my life.

I was broken into six times in two years. My car was tampered with over and over again and anything left outside for ten minutes was gone. The area was always dirty and littered and there was no shortage of dodgy characters around all the time. I lived in a new estate and as soon as the builder painted the wall it was graffitid almost immediately

Now before everyone starts jumping up and down. These are facts. I still have the garda reports to prove it.
On the plus side Id say there was an excellent community spirit and some very decent people living there but it was , without a shadow of a doubt the worst place I ever lived full stop.

I moved from there in 1994 and unless it has changed dramatically since then, I would stay well away.
 
I've lived in Clondalkin village for the last 1.5 years totally disagree with fintans comments. I have had absolutely no cause for concern for my safety whatsoever - in fact quite the opposite. I find the people who I meet in the village to be very friendly & helpful.

I too work in Blackrock as it happens. I leave Clondalkin at 6.45 am and am at my desk at 7.10am (driving via M50). On the way home the longest it's ever taken door to door is just over an hour (an that's in rush hour) - which I think isn't too bad at all. And hopefully when the M50 works are completed it will take less than this.

Have tried using the public transport option a few times (when the car needed to be left at home). I took the LUAS into Connolly & then DART out to Blackrock. Total travel time, including walking to LUAS stop is about one and a half hours.
 
Importer, I don't doubt for a moment that you had a difficult time, but at least you can say that you actually lived there.

I don't deny, either, that Clondalkin has, like everywhere else, areas and estates which have been blighted by social problems. So has Rathfarnham, so has Dundrum, so has, saints preserve us, that bastion of good-living and media darling, Dun Laoghaire. The unfortunate thing for Clondalkin was that the media locked in on bad times and hard times in the early 80's and beyond and decided that 'Clondalkin', which in fact run from Newlands Cross over to Lucan and Bluebell to Rathcoole, was a den of iniquity and a hotbed of scumbags. Any news report just mentioned 'Clondalkin' without specifying the particular sub-area.

The main problem I, and others, had earlier on in this thread was that one person decided to give an 'opinion', which, it would seem, was based entirely on those unfortunate media reports I mentioned in the last paragraph.

To drag this thread kicking and screaming back on-topic, I would say to the OP that I did the daily Clondalkin-Blackrock trip for a while some years ago, and I can say from experience (and not 'opinion'!) that the bus journey makes a real 12-hour day out of your trip. Bus into town --> bus to Blackrock and then the other way around. I enjoyed living in Clondalkin, but for this reason above any other, I would recommend the OP to look elsewhere.
 
Also, it depends what you define as being in Clondalkin. The Clondalkin area is massive, ranging from the N7 to Liffey Valley. Although some of the rougher areas have a Clondalkin address, they are, IMO, too far away from the village to be classed in the same bracket as the village.

As N.I.H stated, south of the canal is the area you should be looking at.
 
Anyone who lives in Clondalkin would advise not to look at North Clondalkin. Knowing all of Clondalkin quite well, I can well understand what happened to Importer.

What I take exception to is someone feeling qualified to offer blase insulting opinions on something they freely admit they know nothing about.

That really is the best one yet.

I dont agree that south of the canal is not the best guideline either, having lived around this area, my cut off for looking would be over the railway bridge.
 
I agree with MandaC completely and some of the other posters who actually know what they're talking about.

That Fintan guy obviously hasn't a clue what he is talking about so I would just ignore him - i think he is just looking for a reaction from people.

He has never lived in the area so he cannot give an informed opinion, his views are totally ignorant and are based on stereo types and hearsay. End of story.

Sorry to hear some posters had bad experiences but As I said in my first post, there are good and bad parts of every area in Dublin without exception. You cannot generalise an area as big as Clondalkin because a couple of estates are bad news. There are some lovely parts of Clondalkin - and the nice parts far outway the bad areas.
 
Without getting into the pros and cons of Clondalkin, the salient point is the ridiculous commute the OP will have to make. That type of thing will grind you down...have a look on a site like myhome.ie and do a search entering your budget, requirements etc and try and somewhere closer to your workplace.
 
Ok then. There seems to be strong views on this subject. I have lived in Clondalkin for the past 10 years first in Cherrywood and now on the Monastery Road.
I like living here and as I see it it is an area that has more positives then negatives going for it. I work in Dun Laoghaire My commute by car is 35 min to work and 1 hour home in the evening . This will improve when the interchange is finished. Public transport in the area is improving all the time. Luas is available from the Red Cow to town (approx 35 min to Conolly). New Arrow Station is opening at Fonthill going to Houston (approx 15 Min). Metro West is going through the village joining The Square, Liffey Valley, Blanchardstown Centre and Dublin Airport (due date 2012) This will also intersect with the previously mentioned lines and Metro North.
All the major Supermarkets are in the village environs and liffey valley is 15 min by car. There are ample National schools and secondary schools. A large park( CORKAGH PARK). Golf Course ( grange castle). Sporting facilities include ( GAA, Rugby, soccer, Basketball and brand new swimming pool)
Clondalkin is an area with a popoulation of 50,000+ people( about the same size as Waterford City), as with any area of this size you will have issues with crime and social deprivation with some area's better than others. Final word is make up your own mind.

N.I.H
 
Getting back to the op, will his budget of 320k buy him a 3 bed house in one of the nicers parts of Clondalkin that you mention. I wouldn't have thought so but I am open to correction
 
Why not try looking at it from the other way, what about Wicklow? Maybe look at places in Bray and Wicklow and go in on the train?
 
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