Now that the daylight hours are lengthening, Niamh O'Donovan's working day is getting proportionately longer. "I have no hesitation making appointments up to nine or 10 at night," she says.

Niamh and her partner Jackie Cohalan run Acorn Property Management in Cork city. "Being an employer and an employee are two different things. If you're working for a company you will clock out at 5 or 6 p.m. and go and play tennis. When you have your own company, you work on. You have to love what you do," explains Niamh.

And if the enthusiasm and energy in her voice are any guide, Niamh loves property management. The company handles three main areas: letting, management and valuation. "Property letting means Joe Bloggs may walk in looking for advice about a three-bedroom house he wants to let. We might tell him how to furnish it; we would draw up a lease and let it . . in residential property management we then act as the landlord, looking after maintenance, repairs and doing visits to ensure the property is alright.

"We may also manage complexes or blocks of flats, looking after the communal areas - landscaping, refuse collection, the general appearance of the building." And the last work area involves valuations of properties, usually for clients who may be thinking of selling.

Acorn Property is not involved in selling. When Niamh opened the company on August 17th 1998, she was clear it was to be totally property management - a niche business.

From Ballinhassig, Co Cork, Niamh went to school in the Convent of Mercy, Clonakilty, and Ashton Comprehensive in Cork city. Her mother saw an ad for a new course in auctioneering and estate agency in Cork College of Commerce. Niamh duly applied and this led, via a one-year diploma, to a year in the University of Glamorgan, Wales.

"Fifteen of us went to Glamorgan. At the start it was a big culture shock. The Glamorgan students had taken a year out to get work experience. They had the edge over us but, within six weeks, we bridged the gap. And since that first year, Irish students have been at the top of the class. Without a doubt it was worth going over there."

Graduating from Glamorgan in 1996, Niamh came back to Cork and worked with Lisney's. "It was fantastic . . . one of the top companies in Ireland. I got to do everything from scaling maps for brochures to viewing residential and commercial properties to doing take-ons (where you go to a property and speak to people who want to sell), to doing rent reviews. I got a taste of every bit of the property market."

Then, she decided to fulfil a long-time ambition and go to Cape Town, in South Africa, to work. "It was like a holiday. It didn't feel like work. The weather was magnificent and the standard of living was much higher than here." After six months - visa renewal time - she decided to come back to Cork. "My mum was sending me the weekender, the Examiner property supplement, every week, and things were beginning were beginning to spark up. The amount of construction was unbelievable."

The following nine or 10 months were spent working for a property management company before Niamh decided to take the plunge from employee to employer. She got her auctioneering licence and found a premises. "But I had no money. It was a case of sitting down and doing up a business plan. I didn't even get to page two of the plan when the bank manager asked me how much I wanted. At the time I was deputy president of the Cork Junior Chamber of Commerce (last year, she was president)."

The business has been going from strength to strength, she says. "I'm in Acorn Property Management for the long haul and I hope the company will be here well after I'm gone."