A brand new BMW 3 series saloon will set you back approximately £35,000 ($45,000, €41,000 or درهم167,000), but for the same sum you could buy a Victorian cottage in 0.103 acres in a “pleasant rural location” in Uckfield, East Sussex.

Set to be offered at auction by Savills, what sounds at first like an utter bargain had to come with a catch: 1 Jubilee Cottages has been unoccupied for over twenty years and now it has collapsed. Offered thus as having “potential for [the] reinstatement of a semi-detached house or a detached house subject to requisite consents,” this may not be quite what it seems.

In August 2019, the cottage made the news after an attempt to gain planning permission to demolish it and its neighbour by Miss Astral De La Mare of the High Cross Estate was rejected by Wealden Council. The rejected plans had proposed for “an estate manor house [with] brick quoins, [the] estate crest in the gable and a reconstituted stone portico.” The submitted plans included relocating the property further away from the “fast and dangerous road where there have been recent fatalities” and turning the existing Jubilee Cottages site “to a native flower rich wild meadow.”

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Two stories to keep beside you

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The site of what remains of one half of the cottages will be sold on 12th February at The Marriott Hotel, Grosvenor Square in Mayfair, London.

Pictured top: The cottage and its neighbour prior to one half collapsing.

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A Cottage With A Catch - £35,000 for cottage in Uckfield, East Sussex – Victorian country cottage in picturesque rural setting in East Sussex for sale for less than a new BMW 3 series saloon – 1 Jubilee Cottages, Eastbourne Road, Uckfield, East Sussex, TN22 5QN, United Kingdom to be sold at auction by Savills on 12th February 2020 at The Marriott Hotel, Grosvenor Square, London, W1K 6JP.
Another view of the cottage (prior to it falling down) illustrating what is on offer.
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A Cottage With A Catch - £35,000 for cottage in Uckfield, East Sussex – Victorian country cottage in picturesque rural setting in East Sussex for sale for less than a new BMW 3 series saloon – 1 Jubilee Cottages, Eastbourne Road, Uckfield, East Sussex, TN22 5QN, United Kingdom to be sold at auction by Savills on 12th February 2020 at The Marriott Hotel, Grosvenor Square, London, W1K 6JP.
A view of the site as it is now.
A Cottage With A Catch - £35,000 for cottage in Uckfield, East Sussex – Victorian country cottage in picturesque rural setting in East Sussex for sale for less than a new BMW 3 series saloon – 1 Jubilee Cottages, Eastbourne Road, Uckfield, East Sussex, TN22 5QN, United Kingdom to be sold at auction by Savills on 12th February 2020 at The Marriott Hotel, Grosvenor Square, London, W1K 6JP.
A site plan of what is offered.