91% off vet college site in Ballsbridge

A 2.02-acre site in the centre of Ballsbridge, Dublin 4, bought by Ray Grehan’s development company at the peak of the property market for €171.5 million, is to be offered for sale again at over €15 million.

The projected 91 per cent fall in value will be the largest slippage so far for a site in Dublin city since the property market collapsed. However, it will be in much the same league as the 25-acre former Irish Glass Bottle site at Ringsend, which was bought for €412 million and is now reported to be worth no more than €50 million. That equates to a fall of 88 per cent.

John Moran of Jones Lang LaSalle is handling the sale of the former UCD Veterinary College site on the instructions of Paul McCann and Michael McAteer of Grant Thornton, who were appointed receivers by Danske Bank.

Grehan’s purchase of the Dublin 4 site in November, 2005, for the equivalent of almost €84 million an acre triggered international interest in Ireland’s property bubble and irresponsible lending by the banks. However, the lending continued for another three years after that before it was acknowledged the economy was in crisis.

Grehan’s opportunist bidding for the site came at a time when several other developers, including Seán Dunne and Bernard McNamara, were jockeying for stakes in the planned high-rise redevelopment of Ballsbridge. Highly ambitious projects were eventually scuppered by the city planners and the remaining bankers, along with Nama, were left to pick up the pieces.

Glenkerrin Homes, run by brothers Ray and Danny Grehan, had debts of €650 million transferred to Nama. Since then Ray Grehan has been declared bankrupt by the High Court in London.

However, Nama is still pursuing him for the proceeds of the sale of an apartment in one of London’s most expensive buildings. The apartment at One Hyde Park in Knightsbridge was bought for £3.7 million.

The Ballsbridge sale will be the first of an important city site acquired during the boom and now available at a knockdown price. Jones Lang LaSalle plans to launch a marketing campaign in April once it has completed due diligence procedures.

John Moran says that with dual zoning for a residential and commercial scheme and a recommended plot ratio of 4:1 he expected the site would be of interest to both Irish and overseas developers.

City planners have already granted permission for 15,600sq m (167,917sq ft) of offices, 2,600sq m (27,986sq ft) of retail and restaurant space, 86 apartments and penthouses and a leisure centre extending to 2,340sq m (25,188sq ft).

The site will be seen primarily as a top class office location and, with the supply of high quality office space slowly but surely running down because of the absence of new developments in the past five years, the likelihood is that the strategically located site of just over 2 acres with frontage on to both Shelbourne Road and Pembroke Road will be acquired by one of the main Dublin office developers.

It is easily the best site to have been offered for sale since the property market took a severe hit.