PROFILE:From a modest start, Liam Carroll went on to become one of Dublin's biggest developers, writes BARRY O'HALLORAN
LIAM CARROLL began his career as a developer 20 years ago with an apartment block and townhouse scheme at Fisherman’s Wharf, close to the East Link bridge in Dublin.
It was a modest enough start, but a sign of things to come. Carroll thrived during the following decade, buying sites the capital’s inner city and building apartments on them to cash in on the tax breaks available to boost urban regeneration.
He has built more apartments in Dublin’s city centre than all his rivals put together, many of them in vast blocks of up to 300 units.
The output of his main company, Zoe Developments, was so prolific that it would be hard to plot a course through central Dublin without passing at least one of the blocks that he built during the Nineties. His approach was simple, he laid out one- and two-bedroomed apartments along narrow corridors, over three or four floors, getting the maximum use out of the sites that he bought.
He was also good at managing his costs. He and a team of technicians designed the buildings themselves (he has a civil engineering background), cutting out the need for architects.
In fact, he once dismissed architects as people who only want to “design penthouses for fellows with Mercs”. Not surprisingly, the profession did not take this at all well and the design of many of his buildings came in for plenty of criticism.
Carroll has always swerved publicity, but Zoe had a very unwelcome spotlight shone on it in late 1997 when a 24-year-old worker, James Masterson, fell to his death on a site at Charlotte Quay in Dublin. It was the third such death on one of his sites. In a subsequent High Court hearing, Mr Justice Peter Kelly told Carroll that he was a “disgrace to the construction industry”. The developer afterwards committed himself to improving safety standards.
Carroll grew very rich during this period and estimates of his worth ran into the billions. However, he has avoided the ostentation of some of his rivals.
He lives in Mount Merrion, a prosperous but unremarkable suburb of Dublin, and for a long time drove a second-hand Toyota, although in recent years he has reportedly traded up to a Mercedes.
He keeps his private life very private and outside his job, focuses on his family. This decade he began spreading his wings, beginning with a raid on quoted property vehicle, Dunloe Ewart, which he wrested from the control of solicitor Noel Smyth in 2002.
Further raids followed, on Aer Lingus, Irish Continental Group, and Greencore, a purchase primarily motivated by the fact that the company has large land banks in Cork and Carlow. However these investments have cost him money.
Last month, it was reported that Irish Continental Group had cost him €58 million, while Gainsco, a vehicle he used to buy into listed companies, had lost over €100 million by the beginning of this year.
Similarly, his flagship Gasworks building in Ringsend in Dublin is empty, as are the Tallaght Cross and Glasshaus hotels in Tallaght. He has also run into difficulties with his Parkway shopping centre in Limerick.
Last month, the High Court heard Carroll’s assets were €259 million, he owes banks €149 million, his rental income is €9.85 million a-year and he is paying annual interest of €7.9 million.
In recent weeks, his creditors have been queuing up to take him on and it was only a matter of time before he took steps like those he took yesterday to get the court’s protection from creditors and win the breathing space he needs to save his business.
