Someone looking for a site on which to build a new house in an established Dublin suburb will get an opportunity to buy one early in March.

Lisney is selling an unusual church hall on one-10th of an acre at 104 Roebuck Road in Clonskeagh at auction on March 9th, quoting an advised minimum value (AMV) of €300,000.

The extremely plain white Plymouth Brethren hall, built on a long, narrow site in the 1930s, is sandwiched between two solid detached redbricks.

The Brethren, a Christian Evangelical offshoot of the Anglican Church, was founded in Dublin in the 1820s.

Arched ceiling

It’s unlikely that a buyer would want to convert the existing 71sq m (764sq ft) building, described by agent David Lisney as Art Deco-style: a small terrazzo-tiled entrance porch opens into a long hall with room to seat possibly 60-plus people.

It has a high arched ceiling and several smaller side rooms off it; a door at the back opens into a long pretty private back garden.

Architect Liam Brennan of Extend (which has offices in Ranelagh and Dalkey) estimates it could cost €350,000 to build a contemporary 149sq m (1,600sq ft) to 232sq m (2,500sq ft) house on the seven metre-wide, 53m-long site, subject of course to planning permission.

The area is zoned “objective A – to protect or improve residential amenity” in Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown County Council’s draft development plan 2016-2022.

The front could be brought forward, to align with the fronts of the neighbouring houses, and a space for parking created – there is no parking space for the hall on very busy Roebuck Road and owners would have to apply for vehicular access.

Brennan, who is currently working on a house closeby, says he had no trouble getting such permission.

Bewley values the neighbouring houses at about €1 million.

The church hall is not far from the Roebuck Road/Foster’s Avenue junction, close to the corner with Harlech Grove, and just across the road from the back of the UCD campus.

There are a few pedestrian entrances to the campus nearby.