Sales of super-prime properties in the UK fall by 86%
Yesterday, the property group London Central Portfolio released data that showed that sales of £10 million-plus properties in the UK had fallen 86% over the past year.
Blaming hefty Stamp Duty increases and Brexit uncertainty, the firm reported that just 5 “super-prime” properties had changed hands between June and August compared to a recorded 35 a year earlier. All of the sales in the period this year were in Central London whilst such properties accounted for just 30% of the figure in the year previous.
Top-end developers, whose sales accounted for 23% of the figure in 2015, were especially affected. They made zero sales in this price bracket in the period and now, according to Naomi Heaton, CEO of LCP, they are reworking their developments to create smaller, cheaper units.
Citygrove Securities PLC and McClaren Properties’ The Clearings development in Chelsea’s Milner Street is being reworked to include fewer super-prime properties
Of this, Ms Heaton commented:
“Many [developers are] looking to divide large, high-priced property into smaller flats to increase their attractiveness”.
Examples given by LCP include Clivedale’s Hanover Square development – where the scheme is being reworked to create four times as many units – and Citygrove Securities PLC and McClaren Properties’ The Clearings development in Chelsea’s Milner Street – where seven townhouses will be replaced with smaller properties.
Speaking more generally, Ms Heaton – who predicts the consequences of this development will be a £45 million fall in Stamp Duty receipts to the government – added:
“This slowdown in the luxury property market—a big contributor for the Exchequer and UK economy—is very concerning. As the government faces the daunting task of negotiating Brexit together with a potential slowdown in the UK economy, it should consider its strategy on residential-property taxation carefully to ensure it meets its objectives of increasing revenues”.
Stamp Duty on a £6 million property was £420,000 under the old system; it is now £633,750. On a £2 million property it was £100,000; it’s now £153,750 whilst in addition buyers of second homes and investment properties now have to pay an additional 3% surcharge also.
Unlucky mansion in Yorkshire with 13 bedrooms for sale for a lower sum than it was marketed for in 2007 – despite having been renovated internally in the time since
Offered for sale for less than it was last marketed in a “dilapidated condition” in 2007, Whinburn Hall in the gritty West Yorkshire mill town of Keighley has now been largely restored internally but is still surrounded by neglected yet Historic Buildings and Ancient Monuments Act 1953 protected grounds.
Described as a “fine country house… contrasting with the cramped rows of terraces in the streets behind them” according to Wikipeda, this Grade II listed Victorian Arts and Crafts mansion was built in 1897 for Prince Smith III (1869 – 1940), an exotically named gentleman who later renamed himself Prince Prince-Smith before becoming Sir Prince Prince-Smith on the death of his father in 1922.
Constructed from wealth generated by the Prince-Smith family’s textile machinery manufacturing business, Prince Smith & Son, the house was redesigned and extended in 1912 – 1913 and became a training centre for the National Institute of Houseworkers in 1940. Sold again in 1950 to the City of Bradford Metropolitan District Council, the “modern manor house” was run as a residential school and special referral unit until 2008 and then, after a period of dilapidation and the rejection of plans to turn Whinburn Hall into flats, was bought by a 35-year old businessman named James Sheldon in 2008.
An unlucky mansion – Whinburn Hall, Hollins Lane, Utley, Keighley, West Yorkshire, BD20 6LU – On the market for £1.45 million in 2016; marketed in 2007 for £1.5 million (or the equivalent of £1.88 million today)An unlucky mansion – James Sheldon purchased Whinburn Hall at the age of 35 and died there aged just 42
Sheldon, who worked as a lifeboat coxswain in Southport for 18 years, restored Whinburn Hall to use as a family home and also based his business Nav-comm, a specialist in the design of LED lighting systems for emergency vehicles, there.
In the years that followed, Mr Sheldon developed what he claimed to be a new form of “anti-terror security equipment” to detect explosives and drugs from 50 metres and took a stand at a trade show in London in 2013 to showcase this. It was later described as being like “an experiment a first year university student would have tried, but which failed” and in due course West Yorkshire Police’s Economic Crime Unit placed Sheldon and his father, Anthony, under investigation.
Both were arrested on allegations of fraud and on 23rd June 2015, after two police officers visited Whinburn Hall to inform the duo that they were to be rebailed for three months, 42-year old James Sheldon tragically jumped to his death from the fourth floor tower of the hall. It later transpired he had been served with an eviction order due his non-payment of the mortgage on the house and faced debts of some £1.25 million ($1.62 million or €1.45 million).
The main property, which is now for sale through agents Dacre Son & Hartley for just £1.45 million ($1.87 million or €1.68 million), currently – rather unluckily, some might also argue – features 13 bedrooms and 7 reception rooms. It comes with a detached bungalow and a dilapidated gatehouse and stands in 7 acres of protected gardens that includes a folly designed by the renowned Lancastrian garden designer and landscape architect Thomas Mawson. Hopefully the next owner, aside from tackling this “overgrown jungle”, will also bring with them better luck.
This ‘baronial hall’ is used as a dining room and is dominated a truly tasteless purple ceilingThe purple theme continues in this galleryAnd there’s more of it in this corridorA drawing room complete with ‘classy’ DFS style furniture and a huge television set could be somewhat improvedA striking fireplace in another room is surrounded by some pretty hideously coloured leather sofasA staircase with a resemblance to something from a fun fairAnother staircase is a little more traditionalOne of thirteen bedroomsThe house is surrounded by 7 acres of overgrown groundsA somewhat amateur attempt at creating a helipad is located close to the houseThe entrance gatesThe roof of the adjoining gatehouse is literally caving in
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Jailed paedophile Rolf Harris set to profit from sale of first original work since he was jailed
Since he was jailed, no painting by the filthy paedophile Rolf Harris has been sold at auction. That’s now about to change given a work by the disgraced 85-year old is being offered in an online auction that ends on 6th September.
Listed by auctioneers Robson Kay – who describe themselves as “corporate recovery agents” – the 182cm by 121cm mixed media painting dates to 1980 and features Harris’ signature in large lettering. It is named ‘Outback Scene’ and was purchased for £14,000 in 2004 by its current owner. He then declined an offer of £44,000 for it in 2008 prior to pervert Harris’ 2014 conviction.
Of the work, which is now being marketed with a much reduced pre-sale estimate of just £5,000 to £10,000, Jonathan Kay of Robson Kay told the Mail Online:
“I suspect there are people who might want it but would be worried what others think and I suspect there are those who like the controversy of having such a work and using it as a conversation piece at a dinner party”.
“Personally, I wouldn’t have it in my home. I discussed it internally and decided it was unlikely our other clients will think poorly of us if we sold it”.
“We are an online auction and so far we can tell that 17 people are watching this item. It might they are curious as to how it fares or they could be serious buyers”.
If the work does sell, Harris will himself profit. Under the Artist’s Resale Rights (ARR) scheme, the child abusing monster will receive 4% of the sale price.
Sex fiend Rolf Harris faces a new trial for further abuse allegations in 2017The painting by the perverted monster offered for sale is titled ‘Outback Scene’
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That the police have ended forensic work into the search for “missing” Madeleine McCann speaks volumes about Theresa May’s sheer lack of judgement
Yesterday, The Sunday Mirror reported that all forensic work into the search for “missing” Madeleine McCann is to stop. In doing so, British police have only confirmed all that we all already knew: This was an investigation that should have ended years ago and it is a disgrace that our new Prime Minister #DarthVader Theresa May continued to fund it so extravagantly and for so long.
Organised by Scotland Yard at the ridiculous cost of £12 million thus far (whilst searches for other missing children get next to nothing), Operation Grange is something that our former Home Secretary Theresa May surprisingly took beyond excessive interest in. She hosted a party in Downing Street attended by Madeleine McCann’s parents in Downing Street in 2012 with the “Chanel-clad” Lady Meyer and in the time since she has continued to be involved via charities called PACT and Action Against Abduction. Separately, Mrs May most recently approved an additional payment of £95,000 to fund the continued investigation into the “disappearance” of the missing child – whose parents paid for child care in the daytime but not at night back in 2007 – in April this year. The activities it funded achieved nothing.
It is simply a disgrace that such a large sum has been squandered on a hunt for one child and though Mrs May wasn’t involved from the very beginning of this somewhat curious story, it is something that has primarily been dealt with in her domain in office. Shame on her: Like with her appointment of three inappropriate individuals in succession to chair the investigation into historic abuse, this represents yet another fine example of her pathetic ability to judge the difference between the right and wrong course of action.
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Thameside boat house that will no longer suffer from flooding for sale for £3.75 million
A riverside home might be wonderful on a sunny summer’s day but when the water rises, they can be an absolute nightmare. The Boat House at Goring in Oxfordshire previously fell into that category, but thanks to a £200,000 food protection and waterproofing scheme, it’s now pretty much immune to the worst the Thames can throw at it and now it’s for sale.
Forget flooding – The Boat House, High Street, Goring, Reading, Oxfordshire, RG8 9AB – £3.75 million or $4.9 million or €4.42 millionThe house was semi-submerged under water in early 2014
Offered by Savills, the 4,547 square foot two-storey house comes with not only a wet boathouse which has moorings suitable for a skiff but also a number of private mooring rings along its 245 foot frontage to the River Thames.
Standing in more than an acre of land, the house– which has been renovated since it was subjected to serious flooding in early 2014 – features 4 reception rooms, 5 bedrooms and 5 bathrooms. It comes with a detached 1 bedroom cottage, a brightly coloured gypsy caravan and a garage block with a gym and workshop.
Of the flooding prevention measures now installed at the property, Biocraft, the firm that carried out the work, commented:
“We developed an innovative and comprehensive flood defence scheme in collaboration with our structural engineer and succeeded in exceeding the clients’ expectations, providing them with security and peace of mind against future flooding”.
The selling agents seek £3.75 million or $4.9 million or €4.42 million for the property.
This room is described as “the river drawing room” and features a vaulted ceiling with exposed timbers, oak flooring and doors opening to a timber balcony overlooking the riverA dining area with doors that open onto the garden and overlooks the river beyondIt forms part of this kitchen with its vaulted ceilingAnother dining areaThere are a total of four reception roomsThe master bedroom is one of five bedrooms in the main houseA view of the house from the gardenThere is also a one bedroom cottage in the groundsThe garden has been professionally landscaped
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