New lord of manor lands NI country home for £1.73m
A PRESTIGIOUS Co Armagh country manor has been sold at auction for £1.73m.
It was purchased for just under the asking price of £1.75m last week.
Dartan Hall, a 17th century mansion, was built by settlers from England and was formerly owned by John Erskine.
The stately home, situated in 115 acres on the outskirts of Killylea, at Kennedies Road, was bought by a local businessman.
The five-bedroom property was built between 1850 and 1860 by the Cross family, who were 17th Century settlers from Lancashire.
It has belonged to Mr Erskine since 1987 and has been extensively restored.
The mansion, located five miles from Armagh city centre, comes complete with a gatekeeper’s lodge at the entrance.
It has retained many of its original features as well as a farmyard stocked with bull pens and cattle sheds which can house 250 animals.
It was listed among leading international properties for sale at $2.31m on US website Mansion Global.
A spokesperson for Best Property Services in Newry said there had been “a lot of interest” in the property that offers “unbound potential”.
He said that the owner, who lives alone and has been farming the land for 30 years, is downsizing as the impressive three-story property is “too large for him”.
Garry Best, of Best Property Services, added that he was “not surprised” that Dartan Hall had been sold for £1.73m. He said: “The attraction to the various people who viewed it and enquired about it, given its 115 acres of land and house centrally situated that is very striking and imposing, is that the opportunity to get that combination is very rare.
“We usually find that people bidding for that volume of land usually have some business interests.”
He added that land of this acreage and quality for sale in Northern Ireland is “in scarce supply”.
Mr Best said that the buyer is likely to have “agribusiness interests”. Two other stately homes in Northern Ireland remain up for sale. The home of former MP Danny Kinahan, Castle Upton in Templepatrick, Co Antrim, has an asking price of £1.35m.
Mr Kinahan suggested that his prestigious property could be of interest to either an individual or corporate buyer. And Maxwell Court in Comber is up for sale at £1.25m. It has been described by estate agent Simon Brien Residential as “one of North Down’s most important private historic residences and probably one of the last period properties and historic residences to be still standing”.