The Health Service Executive (HSE) is understood to be closing in on the purchase for about €40 million of the former St Mary’s nursing home in Dublin 4.Located on a 5.451-hectare (13.47-acre) site immediately adjacent to St Vincent’s University and Private hospitals and the Elmpark Green office and residential scheme, St Mary’s was offered quietly to prospective purchasers by agent Avison Young on behalf of the Religious Sisters of Charity earlier this year.A strategic masterplan drawn up by Reddy Architecture + Urbanism in preparation for the sale identified the site’s potential for a “landmark multi-use development” comprising about 360 apartments across a range of tenures, 315 single-bed student accommodation units primarily intended for medical students, a 250 single-bed step-down/care home facility, a 239-bedroom hotel and about 19,523sq m of private hospital accommodation.The HSE’s move to acquire the St Mary’s campus is understood to be part of a longer-term strategic plan for the development of healthcare infrastructure at St Vincent’s University Hospital and on the lands surrounding it. A portion of the hospital’s existing site is already earmarked for the development of the new National Maternity Hospital.News of the HSE’s acquisition of the St Mary’s campus comes just over two years after it paid about €50 million to secure ownership of US property giant Starwood’s remaining interests at Elmpark Green, the neighbouring office and residential scheme developed in 2007 by Bernard McNamara, Jerry O’Reilly and the late David Courtney at a cost of €550 million. The HSE was advised on its purchase of the Elmpark Green portfolio by QRE Real Estate Advisers. QRE is understood to be advising the State’s health authority on its acquisition of St Mary’s also. Established by the Religious Sisters of Charity in 1868, St Mary’s Home for the “Destitute Catholic Blind”, as it was originally known, was later developed as a healthcare and residential campus. It operated as St Mary’s nursing home and Caritas convalescent home before being placed into liquidation by the order in July 2020.In 2022, the Sisters applied to Dublin City Council to change the zoning of a portion of the St Mary’s lands to reflect the “future development potential” of institutional lands. About 4.85 hectares (11.97 acres) of the site is now zoned as “Z15 – Community and Social Infrastructure", with the remaining 0.53 hectares (1.3 acres) zoned as “Z6 – Employment/Enterprise” in the Dublin City Council 2022-2028 development plan. The objective of the Z15 zoning is “to protect and provide for community uses and social infrastructure”, while the aim of the Z6 objective is “to provide for the creation and protection of enterprise and facilitate opportunities for employment creation”.