What makes it worth a second look is the particular combination of features that have survived together: a hipped roof still covered in thatch, a central brick chimney, and a front facade of five bays arranged with the quiet symmetry that characterised the more considered end of vernacular domestic building in rural Ireland.

Vernacular architecture, meaning buildings put up by local craftsmen using local materials and inherited conventions rather than formal architectural plans, rarely survives intact. The Broghill house retains details that speak to a specific regional tradition. The central door is flanked by projecting jambs, a modest but deliberate piece of stonework that frames the entrance with a little more formality than a simple opening in a wall. An attic window is set into the south-east end wall, suggesting the roof space was used for storage or sleeping. The hipped roof, where all four sides slope down to the eaves rather than meeting a gable at each end, is a form associated with older thatched buildings in Munster and tends to shed wind and weather more efficiently than a gabled alternative. Farm buildings cluster around the yard to the front, and a modern addition has been made to the rear, but the principal facade remains as a reasonably coherent survival of how a prosperous small farm in North Cork might have presented itself to the world.