Lugus Capital / Grayling
Also known as: Larea Fa DAC, Grayling Developments Limited, Grayling Property Management and 36 other companies
Lugus Capital is an investment company founded by Peter Horgan and Tim Cahill, two former executives of the Davy Group.
Larea FA DAC is a property investment company attached to Lugus Capital. Horgan and Cahill are the directors. Through Larea FA DAC, Horgan and Cahill have bought and flipped a lot of property. Their business model is buy - evict - renovate - sell. They usually evict on the grounds of substantial renovation - which is entirely legal.
Using this model, they've evicted a lot of tenants. RTB records show Lugus Capital’s company Grayling Developments Ltd served 15 eviction notices between Q3 2022 and Q4 2024.
Lugus Capital also owns Grayling Properties, a property management company that describes itself as "an asset management service". They act as a letting agent, but are also involved in construction, renovation and buying of property.
Grayling manages co-living spaces: one in Rathmines and one soon-to-be-completed on Cork St. Some of these were former offices which they have converted into co-living units.
Rathmines House - Grayling (archive version)
CO-LIVING COMES TO CORK STREET IN DUBLIN AS SITE SELLS FOR €27.5M - Grayling (archive version)
Grayling Property Management also acts as letting agent/property managers for properties across Dublin. In particular, they manage properties belonging to two separate operations who both happen to also be on our Top Evictors list - Broadhaven Credit Investments (the Irish wing of Bain Capital Investments, a US investment firm) and OCP Belgrave (Orange County Partners), a Dutch investment firm.
Broadhaven / Bain Capital - Landlord Database
OCP Belgrave - Landlord Database
The links between these companies and Lugus/Grayling go much further than a straightforward property management relationship.
Larea Fa is funded by Broadhaven Credit Partners. Broadhaven owns 77% of the equity in Larea Fa, while Lugus holds the remaining 23%.
In 2019, a company called Val Issuer DAC acquired a portfolio of properties in Dublin 8 and Dublin 6, and issued a slew of eviction notices. Val Issuer DAC is a subsidiary of Broadhaven Credit Investments (Broadhaven own 99.99% of the shares. The remaining 0.01% share is owned by another Grayling-linked company, Lugus Rentals Ltd).
Another Grayling-linked company called Belgrave Property Management managed these properties & handled the evictions of over 50 families.
Confusingly, there is another company called Larea FA II DAC (sometimes Larea FA 2 DAC) - this is separate to Larea FA DAC. None of the directors are involved with Grayling Properties, although Grayling’s directors Cahill and Horgan own the company Aliralph Ltd, which holds a tiny amount of the shares of Larea FA II.
A tenant at Leinster Road in Rathmines challenged the eviction notice Larea FA DAC sent to him in 2018. The eviction notice was served on grounds of substantial renovation, and ultimately the RTB ruled in favour of the landlord and he had to leave. He was paying €540 per month. Recently (in July 2024), a flat in the same building was advertised (by Grayling) for €1,370 per month - an increase of over 153%.
Report of Tribunal Reference No: TR0518-002972 / Case Ref No: 0218-4114 - RTB
Property in Rathmines - daft.ie (archive version)
Interestingly for one of our Top Evictors, Lugus / Grayling don’t currently own a huge number of properties. Because their business model is buy - evict - renovate - sell, they have evicted some tenants from properties they own, but in fact they’ve been involved in far more evictions as the property manager, when the owner is a different company (usually Broadhaven or OCP).
Grayling Property Management employees Lena Linehan, Aoife Gaffney and Debbie Fisher are named in several RTB cases as the Landlords’ Representative. Grayling’s subsidiary company Belgrave Property Management was named as Landlord’s Representative in a string of RTB cases from 2019, when 14 families were evicted from the same building ( 5-6 Rosedale Terrace, Clanbrassil Street, Dublin 8) by landlord Val Issuer DAC.
Most of these RTB cases are tenants fighting “substantial renovation” evictions - this is entirely in line with Grayling’s business model. And in all of the “substantial renovation” evictions, the RTB is forced to rule in favour of the landlord, as this is entirely legal.
The role of letting agents and property management companies in evictions is difficult to gauge, but Grayling Property and Belgrave Property Management seem to be very prolific evictors.
Looking at their Daft.ie profile, Grayling appear to have a constant flow of properties to rent. Most are 1-bedroom apartments in sub-divided older buildings going for as much as €1,949 per month. The owners of these properties are often the aforementioned OCP Belgrave or Broadhaven-related companies (Val Issuer DAC, Blondie Issuer DAC, Knight Issuer DAC).
Flat 1 , 12 Grosvenor Square, Rathmines, Dublin 6 - daft.ie (archive version)
They also manage properties for:
- HTMN Investment Funds ICAV (linked to LANGHAM HALL MANAGEMENT S.À R.L., a Luxembourg real-estate investment company). HTMN has secured the eviction of seven tenants via RTB cases, not to mention other cases where tenants may not have disputed their eviction notices.
- Darvilglade Limited (a company belonging to property investors Mary Moloney and Sonia Gleeson of Conservation Assets Limited, who also buy older city centre properties and flip them).
- Nassarius Capital (Ireland) DAC. (Liechtenstein-based firm controlled by the Swiss-based Monterosa Group. In 2022 they bought 21 bedsit houses from Conservation Assets Ltd).