Some months ago, a friend decided to pay Dublin a visit, and we settled on meeting in my then-neighbourhood, Rathmines.
We browsed in a local charity shop, debated on which Melbourne-inspired coffee shop to eat in, and then later took our pick from a half-dozen local bars. Much as it’s always been, the neighbourhood was buzzing with that youthful, modish energy. At one point, in front of the cinema, my friend let out a noise tantamount to a wail. Nostalgia, it seems, had gotten the better of her.
“Oh, I miss living here so much,” she cried. “I had the best times of my life here.”
I wondered what had persuaded her to leave a neighbourhood she loved so much. And then last week, I found out exactly what.
It's no secret that rents have been rising at a rate of knots. And in the more popular neighbourhoods in Dublin city – Rathmines, Sandymount, Portobello, Ringsend – things have been more steep than usual. It became abundantly clear when I started looking for a new place that I was being priced out of my beloved neighbourhood.
Being priced out of Dublin outright is something I have recently seen at close range
In my last week living in the area, I was genuinely sorrowful. I went through the various stages of grief. First there was shock and denial (“No way is that two- bedroom kip €2,600 a month.”); pain and guilt (“Why can’t I afford that much anyway? What kind of a loser am I that I don’t have €2,600 a month for rent?”); anger (“Why do all these other people still get to live here?”); Depression (“This is genuinely worse than I thought.”); the upward turn (“Well, they do have nice cafes in other parts of the country.”) and finally, acceptance and hope (“At least my new place is bigger”).
Being priced out of Dublin outright is something I have recently seen at close range. Friends have decamped to Leitrim, Galway, Belfast, and Britain, because they just can't, or won't, swallow Dublin's rising rents. They too are sad to be leaving their hometown. They'd never envisaged a life where they would be in rural Ireland. And guess what? They absolutely love how things have turned out. The pressing need to be near a dozen restaurants, a nail bar or a branch of Dunnes Home has dissipated.
The thing is, the trendy city spot comes at a premium. You pay for the privilege of being close to the jam-jar cocktails, the quirky vintage shops, the hot yoga and the avocado smashes. Unless you are lucky enough to have lots of money, there will always be a toss-up between location and space. When budgets are limited, as they almost always are, something has to give. And when you’re younger, location easily trumps all else.
I grew up in deepest suburbia, where each house is a replica of the other and all visitors can’t fail to get themselves lost while trying to find your house. As a teenager I was thirsty for the vim of the city, which was a good hour away on the bus. I longed to get away from my stultifying, nondescript housing estate, and mainline into the buzz of city living.
Most of my rent cheque went towards paying for this buzz. I always lived in apartments, with neighbours you could hear through the walls and galley kitchens, and I loved it.
But the thing is, most people then grow up. The area with the buzzy nightlife starts to lose its appeal, becomes downright overrated, in fact. When you’re in your 40s, the need to be around the heat of a trendy neighbourhood becomes less urgent. People want more space because they are cohabiting, or starting a family, or just want a spare room or back garden. And, like my friend, they are happy (well, happy-ish) to wave goodbye to the city hotspot and stretch their legs out in an area less central, trendy or jammed with amenities.
It's a transient neighbourhood in that sense. People tend to stay for four to seven years
Estate agent Kevin DeLappe, while selling a terraced two-bedroom house in the Liberties in Dublin over the summer, also noticed this trajectory.
"It's young professionals who want to buy here now," he told this newspaper back in July. "You get a late-20s, early-30s crowd who are a bit hipstery, a bit Camden Street-y. They are tired of renting an apartment and so they buy a house. Then live here for a while, enjoy the community feel, have lots of parties and then they get sense, grow up and move out. It's a transient neighbourhood in that sense. People tend to stay for four to seven years."
Earlier in the year, I went to visit some friends who live in Naas; friends who had as Delappe might says, got sense. Naas is not without its lively bars or myriad shops, but it was the size of my friends’ house that really gave me pause for thought. Four bedrooms, a kitchen the size of my apartment, a back garden with fruit trees, and antique features to beat the band. I sat in their garden, feeling the slight itch of envy set in. They were living The Good Life, and for a price relatively easy on the pocket.
Move this property an hour up the road to SoCoDu, I thought, and you’d easily be talking a seven-figure price tag.
Rathmines is not closed off to me forever. I’ll visit, enjoy its restaurants and amenities, and remember the times when getting home meant walking around the corner. But for now, I’m in an area that more than holds its own in terms of amenities. And I’m a little in love with my small but perfectly formed house: the first house I’ve lived in since I moved out of the family home. “Welcome back to the northside,” one friend said recently. “You’ll love being back on the right side of the river, where you belong.” And in a way, she’s not wrong.
