Unique opportunities in Donegal and Mayo

A 73AC residential farm at Aghaveagh, Ballybofey in Co Donegal will attract much interest as it comes on the market with a guide price of €395,000.

The holding is located 2.5km off the Ballybofey to Glenfin road just 7.4km from Ballybofey. According to auctioneer Keith Anderson, 25ac of the ground is made up of good quality meadowing and grazing with the rest of the land in reasonably good grazing condition with 6ac of poorer quality.

A residence with the farm is a single-storey cottage with accommodation that includes a sitting room with an open fireplace and a laminated floor, a living room with a solid fuel range, a kitchen with fitted units, a bathroom and two bedrooms while a storage space or box room could be turned into a third bedroom. The house was roofed with new cladding in 2011, the windows are of timber and single glazed with water provided from a private well.

There is a range of farm buildings in the yard including a lofted store, a hayshed that doubles as a lambing shed, a range of stone byres and stores along with a cattle crush and a loading yard.

A country road divides the lands resulting in plenty of road frontage — with the proper planning permission, the roadside fields could have site potential. Much of the land that is located to the rear of the cottage is good quality ground.

According to Mr Anderson, the farm could do with re-stocking and he says a new owner will have a very worthwhile piece of ground and a good project on his or her hands. “The current owner is a part-time farmer retiring from farming and it isn’t often we have a farm of this size in one block on the market in this area so there is great interest all around,” he said.

Ballycroy, Mayo

Moving southwest to Mayo, a unique parcel of ground at the heart of Ballycroy National Park in Co Mayo is being sold by the owners in a private sale. Michael and Margaret Leneghan are selling 400ac of land at Tarsaghaun Beg South, Ballycroy, Westport.

The entire property consisting of 824ac has been in the Leneghan family since 1931 and they are now bringing almost half of the land to the market with a guide of €3,000/ac.

The holding is bordered to the west and east by Ballycroy National Park, one of six in the country. This particular park was established in 1998 and comprises 11,000ac of Atlantic blanket bog and mountainous terrain. Situated about 10km from Bangor Erris and about 12km from the Ballycroy Visitors Centre, the land is bounded by the Bangor Trail, an ancient path which has been used for over a thousand years to travel through the Nephin Beg Mountain.

Michael Leneghan, who lives in nearby Bangor Erris, describes Tarsaughan as a very unusual plot of land, most suited to grazing sheep. “There is no stocking rate as it is a private holding and fencing is subject to planning permission. The land can be sold in a single lot or plots ranging from 25ac to 100ac. It is ideally suited to new or young farmers seeking area based payments,” he said.

For more information on the sale of this unique holding, contact the owners Michael and Margaret Leneghan on 087 6437414.