Ross forks out over £25 million for 28 acres of Guinness land

Dublin's largest housebuilder, Seamus Ross of Menolly Homes, has emerged as the buyer of the remaining houses and land owned by the Guinness family on the edge of the Phoenix Park. Ross, who lives a short distance away at Luttrellstown, paid just over the guide price of £25 million for almost 28 acres - easily the best stretch of housing land to come on the market on the northside in recent years. However, he will probably have to sit on it for a few years until the planners get around to increasing housing densities.

Ross will undoubtedly demolish two of the three Guinness houses on White's Road and replace them with £1 to £2 million-plus homes at the top end of the market. In fact, he seems likely to opt for large expensive homes on most of the site, with a small scheme of high value apartments at the tail end. The houses will look directly over the wooded grounds of Farmleigh, the spectacular Guinness mansion which was bought by the Government for £23 million. They are now about to spend another £11 million on touching it up before opening it as a State guest house.

Seamus Ross has been turning out new homes at an amazing rate over the past five years, building between 700 and 800 starter homes a year. He is currently running three large sites near Clonee, Celbridge and Drogheda. His strategy of going for high volume sales at lower profit margins has worked exceptionally well up to now. But it will hardly apply to the Castleknock land.