Michael Jackson jetzt in Irland !!!

NEWS UPDATE!!!!!
MICHAEL NOW IN DUBLIN!
Last Thursday Michael took the kids to see Pirates of the Caribbean in the DUNDRUM TOWN CENTRE *MY FAVOURITE MALL!!!* Its new and huge House of Frasier, Harvey Nich's, Marks n Sparks, Tesco, they're all in it, he hired out a screen for €1000. A friend of mines mate works there, thats how I know
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NEWS UPDATED!!!!!
MICHAEL JETZT IN DUBLIN!
Letzten Donnerstag ging Michael mit seinen Kindern in das DUNDRUM TOWN CENTRE *mein Lieblingseinkaufszentrum*, um sich "Fluch der Karibik" anzugucken. Es ist ein neues Einkaufszentrum und House Of Frasier, Harvey Nich's, Marks 'n' Sparks, Tesco und alle anderen Geschäfte sind dort vertreten. Er mietet sich einen Kinosaal für 1.000,- EUR. Ein Freund von meiner Freundin arbeitet dort und daher weiß ich das.

Quellen; MJNO, Malibu

With THANKS to ETERNITYS CHILD AT MJJF

The Sunday Times July 23, 2006

Michael Jackson — the property tour

Speculation has been rife about the Irish estates that the star has apparently been to see, but remember, celebrities know how to keep their acquisitions hush-hush, writes Kate Butler

John Huston, who owned a manor house in Galway, was once asked for his advice about living in the west of Ireland. The film director’s response was characteristically to the point: “It’s fine if you can get away from it,” he said.

Despite Huston’s words of caution, the Irish tabloid press has become besotted with the idea of Ireland as a home for A-list stars. Once a personality mentions their fondness for the windswept isle, it sparks a frenzy of speculation: celebrities and property is a match made in gossip column heaven.

This summer, a fresh mythology sprang up when Michael Jackson arrived in Cork airport on Friday, June 23. Newspapers quickly concluded that Jackson, who was travelling with his two young children, was thinking about Ireland as a possible base in Europe.

The troubled star was linked with a number of outstanding properties. At first, it was rumoured that he was staying at the luxury hotel of Blackwater Castle in Castletownroche, Co Cork. Then he was camping out in Michael Flatley’s lordly pile, Castlehyde House near Fermoy.

Stephen Jeffery, of Property Finders, outlined what he thought Jackson would be looking for: “He’ll be seeking a property with grounds that is rural, secure, near an airport and either very modern or very unusual.” While Jackson may have been looking for one thing or another, the papers were sure they knew exactly what he was after.

First stop on the fictional house hunt was the gothic Kinnitty Castle in Co Offaly. Featuring its own ghost, the phantom monk, Kinnitty seemed an ideal choice for a man who reportedly once bid on a “genuine Irish ghost trapped in a bottle” for sale on eBay.

Practicalities, such as a complete lack of control of the surrounding estate (Kinnitty’s forests are owned by Coillte), were blithely ignored. It didn’t take long for the castle’s owner, Con Ryan, to set the record straight. Why would Jackson be interested in taking on a hotel that was booked out for weddings until 2008, he wondered. “My property is being sold as a hotel,” added Ryan. “All the people who have been looking at it have been Irish.”

Kinnitty turned out to have been a phantom quest, but a more substantial prospect rose up in its place: Sandycove Island, off the coast of Kinsale in Co Cork, went up for sale two weeks ago, with a guide price of €1m. Five minutes from the shore, the island has 18 acres of undeveloped land, with only goats for company. Furthermore, the agents dealing with the island haven’t denied that Jackson is interested.

“Jackson didn’t ring me one-on-one, but we did get a very strange enquiry last week,” says Darragh Taaffe of Keane Mahony Smith estate agents in Cork. “A person with a strong American accent rang and asked if they could view the property under cover of darkness.

“They also asked if they could go there on their own volition. I gave them permission to go any time. I asked them for a name and contact details, but there was none forthcoming. An hour later, though, we got a fax from a London firm of solicitors relating to the property, and there was a confidentiality clause with it.”

Islands are like buses, however, and Sandycove isn’t the only offshore property currently on the market. Following the death of Charles Haughey, his family are reported to be selling Inishvickillane, one of the Blasket Islands off the coast of Kerry, which the former taoiseach used as a getaway.

But no matter how preposterous the idea of Jackson living on Haughey’s bolthole is, or in a gothic castle used for luxury weddings, it’s not too much of a stretch to see the reclusive star opting for an Irish pad.

His LA-based spokeswoman, Raymone Bain, confirmed in June that Jackson was planning to move to Europe and start his career afresh, while Jackson’s financial advisers have examined the potentially lucrative tax breaks Ireland gives to artists.

As to where he might live, however, it’s unlikely that the press will ever find out before the electric gates have been installed and the guard dogs let loose. The reality is that when celebrities go shopping for property, they are extremely careful to keep their name out of the news. Indeed, when viewing houses, many opt for hush-hush lists of those not publicly for sale.

“I have a couple of properties at the moment and the vendors don’t want any publicity,” says Charles McCarthy, an estate agent in Cork.

Michael Daniels, another agent in Cork, agrees that celebrities are adept at doing business quietly. “Generally you’d be dealing with their representatives, their lawyers or their agents. Perhaps on the third visit you’ll get the person themselves, but the groundwork will have been done.

“Privacy is the key word, along with something that is accessible to airports.” McCarthy says that he has sold properties to celebrities who hadn’t even viewed the houses.

So while genuine celebrity property shoppers like to keep things under wraps, where do the rumours come from? There is the possibility that some agents hype up a property by dropping hints about celebrity interest.

In July 2003 when an estate agent revealed that Bill Clinton was going to buy a luxury apartment at the K Club’s Ryder Cup Village, the development got unprecedented coverage — until Clinton denied interest.

A year earlier it was claimed that Robert Redford had his sights on a penthouse apartment in the Corr Castle development in Sutton. But not even this A-list imprimatur could shift the property. On the market for more than a year, the apartment was reduced by €150,000 to hurry up a sale.

Daniels agrees that a rumour about celebrity interest can be counterproductive. “It’s the kiss of death on marketing campaigns because very often it’s hype without substance,” he says. “Agents may hope that revealing a celebrity interest in a property will generate publicity, but it’s a double-edged sword. It can often drive genuine interest away for fear that the price will escalate beyond what they can afford.”

In the days of Huston, the best of Ireland’s luxury homes, with their sweeping estates, could be picked up a dozen for a penny. Since the mid-1990s, however, celebrities may not find it so easy.

In 1994, Sarah Ferguson, the Duchess of York, was reported to have sent representatives to view Dromderrig House in Kinsale, Co Cork. Close associates confirmed she was interested in buying in the area. Although there were concerns about security in Ireland at the time, Ferguson’s plans to live in Kinsale were scuppered by a killer move from the east. Des McGahan, an Irish entrepreneur based in Hong Kong at the time, had his eye on Dromderrig and made a bid.

If Jackson is serious about buying himself the secluded paradise of Sandycove, he may come up against the same problems that Ferguson encountered. Gerry Gannon, the property magnate who owns the K Club with Michael Smurfit, has bought two public houses in Kinsale in recent years — the Folk House and the Bulman — through Cohalan Downing & Associates in Cork and, it is rumoured, has his sights on Sandycove.

If he does, Jackson may find himself head-to-head with an A-lister of another kind: the Irish property developer.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/newspap...279539,00.html

Multi-million euro house sales prove that market is still buoyant

By Tommy Barker
29 July 2006

IS the market peaking? Despite an apparent slowing in the house market mid-sector over the summer months, some choice and record €4 and €5-million plus Munster house sales would indicate that confidence remains high at the uppermost end of the scale.

Cork and Waterford country house sales have seen €4 million paid out by buyers from the UK.

And, a new Cork city house price record has been set with the unconfirmed and privately negotiated c €5 million-plus sale of Woodlawn, in the stalwart city suburb of Sunday’s Well.

Widely rumoured for months, the deal has now finaly closed legals, with buyers Bill and Marian Keary, who have garage businesses and motor dealerships as well as property developments. Their own Mallow home, Rock Cottage on two town acres, is on the market with Michael O’Donovan of Sherry FitzGerald O’Donovan, jointly with Hamilton Osborne King.

Wodlawn’s vendor was shipping freight business and property developer Gerry Callanan, owner of the trendy Boqueria tapas bar in Cork city, who hugely upgraded the vaguely French-looking Woodlawn (previously owned by the Kiely medical family) in the past six years of ownership, spending hundreds of thousand of euros on the acre of riverside gardens and putting a conservatory in the roof. Mr Callanan owns several other exclusive Sunday Well properties/investments.

Meanwhile the Victorian-styled 2,800 sq ft family home at 4 Lindville off the Blackrock Road has just had sale terms agreed at about €1.8 million. It had a clearly too-low guide price, quoted in excess of €1.2 million, with Hamilton Osborne King, who declined to confirm the reported sale.

Vendor was businessman Olan Trevor, and the price shows a huge capital appreciation in the Lindville scheme of homes.

Meanwhile, singer Michael Jackson was NOT the buyer of Ileclash, a nine-bedroom River Blackwater country house on about nine acres of prime Munster land, with salmon fishing rights and two guest cottages.

The period home of very high quality had been quietly on the market with Michael H Daniels & Co, and is understood to have been bought for about €4 million. Given the property market presence of Jackson in recent weeks (he has been viewing a number of privately-set top Irish homes) every sale has a rumour of his involvement. However, Mr Daniels said the purchaser was from the UK.

Meanwhile, another Munster home has sold in the same 4 million price bracket. Woodstown House, in Co Waterford, was also bought by a UK buyer, according to local sources, and vendor was Cork property developer Seamus Geaney, who commuted to and from the Waterford house by helicopter. Michael H Daniels & Co declined to confirm the low-key deal.

http://www.irishexaminer.com/irishexaminer...9508-qqqx=1.asp