Last Friday, auctioneer Eamonn O’Brien of CCM Property, Mitchelstown, sold a substantial farm situated at Dawstown, Blarney, Co Cork, for €1.97m, or €11,220/acre. The farm, which had been guided at €1.6m prior to auction (€9,000/ac), was bought by a local dairy farmer.

According to O’Brien, it was a “fabulous auction” for everyone involved with over 100 people in attendance at the auction room at Corrin Mart, Fermoy.

“We had eight bidders for the farm,” says O’Brien. “We opened after a bid of €1.25m and 20 bids later the farm had a new owner.”

The bidding had increased in increments of €50,000 a time until it reached €1.75m. At this point it was put on the market.

In the end, the bidding came down between two interested parties with a final offer of €1.97m enough to secure the farm for the local dairy farmer.

Irish Country Living understands that an offer of €1.6m, matching the guide price, had been made to the vendor 10 days prior to auction. Luckily for the vendors, they decided to turn down the offer and proceed with the auction as planned where they made substantially more than they were hoping for.

The farm

The 176-acre farm, which is laid out in one block and divided into 17 good-sized fields, has extensive road frontage on to two roads. The farm is all in grass and the majority of the land is of good quality and extremely dry. A stream passes along the lower end of the farm and a couple of small fields adjoining it are overgrown and in need of reclaiming.

The three bedroom farmhouse is a two-storey building dating back to the 1920s. Although the house is in good condition, it has plenty of room for modernisation.

The house, which offers total privacy, is set in off the road and is accessed via a long gravel avenue that is flanked by tall sycamore and horse chestnut trees all the way down. The house and farm is serviced with a mains water supply.

To the rear of the house is the farmyard. This part of the property is where the most work is needed for the purchaser. A number of old stone farm buildings in the yard are in need of work and improvement to be converted to modern housing for animals.

The yard also features a spacious hay barn and two lean-tos. The major bonus for the yard is that there is plenty of space to expand should the buyer wish to construct new buildings or a milking parlour.