€43,000,000 knocked off price of Ireland's most expensive house

When the hammer came down on this seven-bedroom Edwardian red-brick house on Shrewsbury Road in Dublin back in 2005, a new record for the world's most expensive house (per square foot) was set. The 4,000 sq ft Tudor-style house, named Walford, had been advertised for €35m (£30.5m) but came out the other end of the auction having relieved its new owner of €58m. Property in Dublin had soared to such insane heights on the back of cheap credit and greedy borrowers that it had become more expensive than New York, London and Paris.

Shrewsbury Road is a pleasant, tree-lined avenue in the middle of embassy-belt Dublin. It was once ranked as the sixth most expensive street in the world, ahead of Beverly Hills' North Carolwood Drive and St Moritz's ritzy Via Suvretta. Now, in what will give the Irish public a huge sense of schadenfreude, the house is on sale for €15m – a loss of €43m for the owners, or more likely their banks. And it needs a total refurb.



After lying empty for the last six years, the auctioneers – Lisney and Savills – have revealed that the 18th century marble fireplaces have been stolen and the floors are bare. The spectacular collapse in price illustrates the madness of the Celtic Tiger years. The house was not bought as a pleasant place to live for the buyers but because of its development potential.

Planning permission was given for two houses in the grounds – but the owners sought to build no fewer than nine houses to the rear of the residence, with underground parking for each property. The sale of Walford is an admission of defeat for the owner who has never been officially named but is widely thought to be Gayle Killelea, the journalist-turned-lawyer wife of developer Seán Dunne, dubbed the "baron of Ballsbridge".

There's a video showing the current state of Ireland's most expensive house here.