Mount Oval, Rochestown, Cork

Hi,

I have a house in Mount Oval and I have to say that I am reasonably happy with the quality of the work but I must attach a big BUT..

No house in a housing estate will ever have the same attention to detail and quality of finish as a one off house which is being regularly supervised by your engineer/architect and built by a builder who has to deal with you personally. In many housing estates the only quality control/inspection is the snaglist made by your representative in advance of handover. At that stage it is very difficult to see potential problems so most of the snaglist items will relate to decoration rather than anything structural. Also, the fact that there is rarely power or lighting in a house at inspection stage means that poor finishes areas with no natural lighting such as understairs wcs etc. are very common. In short.. the finish isn't great but it is probbaly above average for a 1990s/2000s Irish housing estate.

The common areas are extremely well maintained in mount oval at the moment and this is free of charge. This is because the builder still has 60+ houses to sell and is doing the work at his own expense. It is something of a concern for the future as there is no management company in place for the houses and there is also a potential future problem of litter and vandalism by local hoodies (the builders pick up rubbish almost every day near the village area, replace vandalised young trees and other damage very quickly).

Traffic wise, on a wet September morning when the anxious mammies haven't quite gotten into their routine it can take an hour to get to Douglas not to mention Cork city centre if you get your timing wrong. It seems to ease out during the year somehow but avoid school rush times in the mornings if you can.

Hope this helps.
 
I have to disagree with your comments about housing estates. We bought in a very large housing development in Carrigaline and were thrilled with the quality of the finish. TBH we didn't realise how good it was until friends commented and until we bought an O'Flynn Constr house. There are builders out there, who even in the good times, did care about the quality of their finish. Grant it - they are few and far betwen.
 
I'm not saying that you cannot get a good finish in a building estate, all I'm saying is that you have no guarantee of the quality unless you have someone with your interests in mind regularly inspecting and supervising the quality of the work. You can always get lucky and have good tradesmen working on your house who will do a good job whether supervised or not or perhaps a very good foreman. Lucky for you in your case in Carrigaline but not for all as you saw in Mount Oval.
 
I recently saw O'Flynns advertised prices for mount oval, and thought they were hilariously overpriced.
I've been keeping an eye on the market in Douglas/Rochestown over the last year or so, and little or nothing has been moving. Think there's still a lot of people living in the past around here who have too much airs and graces to accept the their house would ever lose value.

There's actually a glut of new estates including some ghost estates in the area (Monfield, Mount Oval, Carmen Lawn, Maryborough Ridge, The Borough, Courtwood...) , and i've hardly seen any sign of anything moving.
 
apartment on the paper for 190k 2 bed up there so i'ed say some folks up there aren't laughing all the same.
Elden seems to have come down in price since it was first released to the market - nicer houses in my opinion too.
 
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