All eyes will be on Lisney's auction rooms next Tuesday for the first auction of the season which will see rogue solicitor Michael Lynn's Howth house put under the hammer.
Glenlion has an AMV of €4.5 million. Lynn and his wife Bríd Murphy paid over €5 million for the 4.75-acre property in 2006.
Lisney's Darren Chambers is confident ahead of the auction saying that of the 35 people who have viewed the property, five are regarded as serious buyers. Contracts of sale have been sent out to a number of individuals, he adds.
The house is being sold on the instructions of the court appointed receiver Rory O'Ferrall of accountants Deloitte & Touche.
Glenlion House is in a sorry state of disrepair but stands on a knockout site with uninterrupted views of Dublin Bay, including the nearby Baily lighthouse, and has its own private beach.
The property has an interesting history. James Bayley Butler (professor of zoology in UCD) originally developed the site in the 1920s and spent weekends and summers at his clifftop hideaway with his family. They stayed in tents and later wooden huts and had running battles with the indigenous wild goats. The house was finally built in 1950.
The professor was quite a character, says his great granddaughter Margery Godinho. One of his party tricks was to hypnotise frogs and hens! He spent much time cultivating a Roman garden, using carved stone and columns salvaged from buildings damaged during the War of Independence.
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