Manor house

[Jon Maine]

There is a rather lovely house on the market in need of restoring come up. I believe there is some urgency to the sale and the price is negotiable, to what I do not know. It has a wing which has been "modernised" so has comfortable accomodation on site whilst repairing the rest.

Just scroll to the last property on the last page of this link.

http://www.stonebridgesouthwest.co.uk/pfs.htm

They have mis-quoted the age it predates 1700.

 

[JoceAndChris]

Mmmm, lovely indeed. I'm glad it's listed, so hopefully won't be gutted and turned into an awful hotel...I'd be a bit concerned about the "modernisation" and open-plan design of the cottage, myself, but this does seem like an absolute bargain.

 

[Jon Maine]

Yes the wing has been converted in a way that is probably inappropriate, the design may not be to bad but some of the materials and workmanship would be questionable.

The main house has had all of its floors replaced with modern structures, so very sound but not period, it has a paneled room almost complete to refurbish and an amazing staircase to overhaul too. It is structurally sound and needs mainly the cosmetics done to bring it back to being a stunning house. If I had some money I would be doing some negotiation with them right now.

I looked at buying it in 1993 but could not afford it, a chap moved down from Oxford and bought it and we became friends. He stayed there until 3 years ago or so before emigrating to NZ. Sadly whilst he undertook the majority of the external work bar the front elevation he never managed to split the Elephant up into bite size chunks and looked at the whole job getting depressed about it. Shame as whilst some rooms may take more and some less I envisaged around 3 weeks work in each room for a couple of people would see it return to a splendid condition.

The latest occupants are simply not the right people for the house sadly but I believe the husband has had to go away and leave his wife to deal with it all and she has just put it on to the market. I think there could well be some pressure to sell so there may be some keen negotiation to be had if any one is interested.

I can see for around £150k it would be a stunning property, of course more could be spent but that should be enough to make it a very special house again.

 

[JoceAndChris]

How interesting, a lot of lessons to be learned there. A house like that needs a purpose: it's huge. The ideal is a very wealthy family with 4 or 5 kids and perhaps an aged P or 2, but there seem to be so few families like that compared to the number of large, historic properties for sale. I can just picture various inexpertful couples falling in love with it and then getting crushed by its scale, heaven knows, we get daunted enough with this 3/4 bedroom house! There is a similar sad case down the road, the house where the bouncing bomb was developed, it's just empty now, the couple who bought it have fled to NZ.

What a pity today's large, extended families are now not the kind of families to live in houses like that.

If I stumble across a spare half a million, Jon, I'll pass it along, it would be great for this house to fall into your hands.

 

[Jon Maine]

It would be nice to find someone who wants it for a top quality house that has a bit of money and lots of vision.

 

[jocelyn plummer]

Oh how I wish---------------- could soon sort that

 

[Jon Maine]

Oh how I wish---------------- could soon sort that

Oh go on you know you want to........................and you could pop around for tea and cakes as its 2 minutes walk from here

 

[Penners]

A very tempting project, Jon. And with loads of free expert advice just down the road, eh? :wink:

However, one more "project" and I can see the divorce courts looming....

 

[Jon Maine]

Must be right for someone even if I cant convince you Penners.

 

[skier-hughes]

How about 10 of us all put in some money in and Jon can do all the work, it is only 2 mins from him after all!!!!!!!!!

 

[Penners]

B*gg*r off!

Why should he have all the fun?!

 

[Jon Maine]

I would love to get my hands on it, but sadly do not have the money.

I just hope someone more sympathetic than the last owner comes along.

 

[skier-hughes]

My wife tells me I'm very sympathetic..............

NO hangon, it's Pathetic, doh!!!!