Property investors expand their horizons as Bacon bites

"Bricks and mortar" remained a popular investment choice with Irish investors in 1999 but many of them opted to look further afield when buying property as the Bacon measures started to bite, a trend that is expected to continue in 2000.

Although estate agents said a healthy chunk of residential sales in the Republic continued to be accounted for by investors, particularly high-earning professionals such as doctors and lawyers, more and more investors went abroad to buy property.

At the smaller end of the market, areas like Marbella and Florida proved popular with those in search of a holiday home that would go some way to paying for itself. Not surprisingly, Britain - a market with a broadly similar system to our own - also attracted large numbers of Irish investors, drawn by the value on offer as well as the ease of doing business there.

London proved a particularly popular choice with Irish money pouring into all sorts of property, residential, commercial and industrial, this year. But while the British capital still offers opportunities, it may already be too late to make a real killing, estate agents say.

"London still offers very good value and a good return on money but the tremendous value available in London about 18 months ago is not as readily available now," says Mr Simon Ensor of Sherry Fitzgerald. "Those who led the posse into London are looking elsewhere."

Other large population centres, such as Manchester and Liverpool, are increasingly attracting Irish investment, while Scotland is expected to feature on Irish investor lists next year.

The continued progress of the Northern Ireland peace process is also drawing southern cash northwards as optimism grows that political stability will lead to greater investment returns.

"A lot of southern money is going North," Sherry Fitzgerald says.

France is another area likely to prove popular with Irish property investors in the New Year. While some people are buying holiday homes in areas like Provence, Paris is where the big money is likely to go.

"The rental return relative to capital outlay is very good. It's not that difficult to buy and can be self-financing," Mr Ensor says.