Good looking family trade-up thanks to recent upgrades at this €475,000 Midleton home 

LOOKING impressively fresh for a home that has passed its milestone 21st birthday, No 53 Meadowlands is a good advert for how to make an impact through a series of small-scale renovations.

Built in the noughties by now-defunct McInerney Homes in the area of Midleton known as Broomfield, it’s the first time the house has come up for re-sale.

For those already living in Broomfield who would like to decamp to a larger home while staying in the neighbourhood, No 53 may well be worth a look. It’s a good bit roomier than Broomfield’s three-bed semi-ds, which average at around 123 sq m (No 53 measures 149 sq m).

 It’s also detached and the bedroom count is five. This includes a ground-floor bedroom, but new owners might find it more useful as a home office or playroom.

There’s plenty of daytime accommodation besides, including an open-plan kitchen dining room, with an adjoining living room, which can be opened up or closed off, via newly-installed pocket doors. 

The doors were one element of the ground-floor renovations, which also saw a sleek new kitchen fitted, new flooring laid and a new front door installed in 2021.

While the attention paid to the downstairs’ interiors is obvious, the owners took good care of the garden too. 

A covered-in pergola off the dining area shelters the patio sitting-out area, while a bank of greenery at the bottom of the garden provides shade for a second sitting-out spot.

 A raised bed is filled with attractive planting and there’s a nice bit of lawn and a garden shed.

 It’s reasonably low maintenance, but more importantly, it’s south-facing.

Kyle Kennedy of Hegarty Properties, the agent looking after the sale of No 53, says the covered pergola is “like having an outdoor room”. Then there’s the large green out front, an attraction for families who tend to gravitate to the neighbourhood.

“Broomfield is a family favourite, it’s within walking distance of MIdleton town centre, and it's also adjacent to the N25, offering easy access to Cork city. Moreover Midleton train station which operates a regular service to the city is within a 10 minute walk,” Mr Kennedy says.

He adds that Midleton has “everything you need” from supermarkets, to a weekly Farmers’ Market loaded with fresh and local produce, to national and secondary schools, to sports pitches. And of course a new greenway, of which the first phase, from Midleton to Mogeely, is completed, with plans to extend it eventually as far as Youghal.

Mr Kennedy predicts good interest in the Meadowlands home, which has C1 energy rating and a guide price of €475,000. Earlier this year a similar sized Meadowlands property, No 81, sold for €446,000, albeit it was a four-bed semi-d, which had been extended to the rear.

VERDICT: Turnkey trade-up in family friendly location.