A raffle last night for a holiday cottage in County Mayo to raise funds for healthcare workers has been won by a woman living in Dublin.
The couple who own the home near Foxford which raised close to €1 million in the raffle described the level of interest as “unreal”.
A Canada-based Irish couple, who are both Covid-19 survivors, decided in June to raffle their house because they wanted to give something back after surviving the virus.
The Irish Times is reporting that the decision to raise money for healthcare support workers sprang from a combination of their own recent experience of the virus, seeing friends and family around them affected by cancer, and a lifelong belief that support staff in hospitals do not get the recognition they deserve.
The tickets cost €10 and the money rolled in for weeks and quickly surpassed the couple’s initial target of €250,000.
The 150-year-old cottage, on the Mayo side of the Ox Mountains, had been placed on the market through local agent CK Auctioneers earlier this year and attracted offers of up to €90,000.
In a statement on its website this morning CK Auctioneers said the “winner of the cottage is a Dublin lady. Under GDPR we are awaiting permission from winner to publish their name.”
