When a converted broom cupboard in Knightsbridge made £60,000 in the mid1980s it indicated that London property prices had gone mad. In Ireland, at that time, £60,000 could have bought a fine Victorian house in Rathgar, or a house on several acres in counties Wicklow or Meath. Twelve years on, those prices have passed into folklore. According to the figures released by the Department of the Environment, the average price of a secondhand house in Dublin has reached £102,436 - up from £82,000 in 1996, £70,736 in 1995, and a 1993 figure of £60,496. The average secondhand house price outside the capital is £80,276 - up from £67,438 in 1996, £58,526 in 1995, £55,033 in 1994 and £52,559 in 1992.
Although prices have risen steadily around the State, the most dramatic increases have occurred in Dublin, which has had two property booms in the last decade. The first, in the late 1980s, saw prices rise by 52 per cent between 1987 and 1990. During these four years, the average price of a secondhand house in Dublin jumped from £38,700 to £58,936.
For the next five years, to the end of 1994, values rose by just 10.6 per cent and prices fell in some three-month periods, particularly following the currency crisis in late 1992 which sent mortgage rates up.
By 1995 the market was moving again. The Dublin secondhand market rose by 15 per cent in 12 months. The following year, prices rose by 20 per cent, and last year the official figure was 23 per cent. But estate agents say that in parts of Dublin values rose by as much as 40 per cent in 1997.
Prices have moved on considerably since last December, says Sherry FitzGerald, Dublin's biggest estate agency. According to recent figures released by the firm, Dublin house prices rose by 17 per cent in the first three months of this year. A handful of recent sales show how fast the market has risen. Last week, a tiny one-bedroom apartment - in The Northumberlands development off Mount Street - sold for just over £117,000.
In 1995, when new, it cost £55,000. Take an ordinary four-bedroom semi in Vergemount Park, Clonskeagh. It was sold after auction last November for a figure thought to be under £220,000. Earlier this month it sold for £290,000. A Victorian four-bedroom house on Merrion Road sold in March for £430,000. Two years ago it made £238,000 and two years before that, in 1992, it failed to sell at auction, having been withdrawn at £158,000.
Then there is 36 Herbert Park, a large detached house in Ballsbridge that changed hands privately last November for around £850,000. Earlier this month it sold at auction for £1.56 million. These highlight a market that has consistently defied predictions and bolstered many a dinner party conversation. Where will it end? Nobody seems to know, not even the so-called experts.
