E
ellsbels
Guest
My parents own just under half an acre of land in South Co Dublin. My family home is built in the middle of the land (approx. 1,300 sq. foot bungalow). The family (parents, myself and two other siblings) have been talking about the possibility of developing the land to benefit the whole family.
We have sought advise from a number of people on what’s the best thing to do with it and have come to the conclusion that to utilise the land to the maximum, instead of building around the family home, (which was the original idea) that we should knock the family home and start again. Everyone is in agreement with this (including my parents, on the condition that they are at the very least, put back in the position that they are in now .ie. that they end up with a fully furnished house with no mortgage). The problem is what is the best way forward? There are a number of major issues that we have to consider –
Issue One:
Our land (and our access road) is directly attached to land that is owned by the County Council. There are a few old council houses already on this land, however they are all privately owned now. The problem is that the council has plans to build social housing on this land now. I’ve seen the plans for this housing and they are planning on building on every blade of grass that’s available to them as far as I can see!!
Issue Two:
Approx. 0.75 acres of privately owned land directly attached to another side of our property is up for sale and the reason it hasn’t sold yet is that the developers that are interested are a bit wary of the fact that it’s quite a narrow plot. This land also has its own road access to the main road.
Issue Three:
Part of our land is also attached to a large field, which has been sold to a developer who is going to develop it to the max in the near future.
Our original idea was to build four decent size houses which myself, my parents and one of my siblings would live in and to sell off the last house to help finance the build. My other sibling has no desire to live beside my parents and would be agreeable to being left my parents house in their will or a cash sum from myself and my other sibling.
However, we are now not sure if we will want to live where we are with all the development that is inevitable, therefore we are now thinking that we should go for six houses and, in order to make them a decent size, we should go for three storey dwellings (all indications from planners are that they would not object to this).
Should we:
(1) Go it alone – Develop the land ourselves and use our current access road. This means that we would have to finance the project ourselves and organise the build ourselves.
(2) Approach the Developers – Approach the developers who are interested in the 0.75 acres beside us and see if we could do a deal with them .eg. some sort of a land swap in return for X amount of houses. This would avoid the need for huge financial investment by us and the headache of project managing the build. It would also mean that we may be able to use their road access instead of our current one.
(3)Sell Up – Sell up and get out. I don’t think that this is a good option as my parents don’t want to move out of Dublin and would have to buy an alternative (expensive) Dublin property.
(4)Any other ideas that we haven’t thought of?
You’re ideas / suggestions would be greatly appreciated.
We have sought advise from a number of people on what’s the best thing to do with it and have come to the conclusion that to utilise the land to the maximum, instead of building around the family home, (which was the original idea) that we should knock the family home and start again. Everyone is in agreement with this (including my parents, on the condition that they are at the very least, put back in the position that they are in now .ie. that they end up with a fully furnished house with no mortgage). The problem is what is the best way forward? There are a number of major issues that we have to consider –
Issue One:
Our land (and our access road) is directly attached to land that is owned by the County Council. There are a few old council houses already on this land, however they are all privately owned now. The problem is that the council has plans to build social housing on this land now. I’ve seen the plans for this housing and they are planning on building on every blade of grass that’s available to them as far as I can see!!
Issue Two:
Approx. 0.75 acres of privately owned land directly attached to another side of our property is up for sale and the reason it hasn’t sold yet is that the developers that are interested are a bit wary of the fact that it’s quite a narrow plot. This land also has its own road access to the main road.
Issue Three:
Part of our land is also attached to a large field, which has been sold to a developer who is going to develop it to the max in the near future.
Our original idea was to build four decent size houses which myself, my parents and one of my siblings would live in and to sell off the last house to help finance the build. My other sibling has no desire to live beside my parents and would be agreeable to being left my parents house in their will or a cash sum from myself and my other sibling.
However, we are now not sure if we will want to live where we are with all the development that is inevitable, therefore we are now thinking that we should go for six houses and, in order to make them a decent size, we should go for three storey dwellings (all indications from planners are that they would not object to this).
Should we:
(1) Go it alone – Develop the land ourselves and use our current access road. This means that we would have to finance the project ourselves and organise the build ourselves.
(2) Approach the Developers – Approach the developers who are interested in the 0.75 acres beside us and see if we could do a deal with them .eg. some sort of a land swap in return for X amount of houses. This would avoid the need for huge financial investment by us and the headache of project managing the build. It would also mean that we may be able to use their road access instead of our current one.
(3)Sell Up – Sell up and get out. I don’t think that this is a good option as my parents don’t want to move out of Dublin and would have to buy an alternative (expensive) Dublin property.
(4)Any other ideas that we haven’t thought of?
You’re ideas / suggestions would be greatly appreciated.