The amusing and long-running tale continues of the luxury 7-bedroom Croydon houses being offered with no garages and profoundly awkward vehicular access - at, errr, £1.65m apiece.
Well, they still haven't sold - despite the steeply-inclined driveway being nicely paved now, and one or two other cosmetic finishing touches being added (saplings, gates, handrails on the steep concrete steps, see these recent pics).
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| Steep prices, steep driveways - & no garages |
But they are now also being promoted by yet another estate agent - which specialises in marketing properties intended for buy-to-let.
Can multiple occupancy and asylum-seekers be far behind? They wouldn't have seven cars to go with the seven bedrooms ... (at least, not until they've "joined the labour market") and would be glad of the five bus routes that pass the front door, some of them 24/7, on the busy A232 'Red Route'.
ND
When we bought our present house we assumed we'd make good use of the local buses. But we can't: the bloody things are unreliable. So if we want to travel by bus we drive to a park-and-ride site where at least you get to wait for a bus's departure by sitting inside it rather than than standing out in the wind, or cold, or rain, or heat.
ReplyDeleteI’m continually surprised, even though I shouldn’t be, at the amount of overpriced tat that sellers keep proffering to an unconvinced market round my way (north Hampshire).
ReplyDeleteAppalling decor, couldn’t-give-a-stuff student digs level presentation, hideous cheap extensions and front gardens given over entirely to parking.
People simply won’t buy rubbish, not in the current economic climate.
My WI contact tells me there are 17 houses up for sale or hoping to sell in local village. Some have been on the market a very very long time, local chap tells me market is totally dead. Bad luck on the newly created widows, an ever growing stream. There were some asking a mil but that hope has long gone. Down around the £300k mark you can sell.
ReplyDeleteObvs the budget puts the block on, maybe the spring will bring forth flowers and buyers - or floods. Who knows. Knock on effect is the boot fairs and local junk markets have nothing but books and kids toys. Hardly a table lamp or coal purdonium to be seen.
Down the road is a Croydon look-alike. Three detached houses crammed on to an old scrap yard complete with preserved oak trees overshadowing everything. By detached I mean 1 metre gaps. Been on market for at least 3 years. Eejit.
My own driveway is as steep as that.
ReplyDeleteWithout the gates,
You get used to it.
A steep driveway of any length makes an automatic car more desirable, in NZ with a lot of hills it's all auto.
ReplyDeleteOK, Bill, but do you need to maneouvre past a big plane tree, onto and off a very busy main road?
ReplyDeleteAnd wait until there's a car on that shared drive for every adult in each 7-bedroom house ... then try the requisite 5-point (7-point?) turn to exit facing forwards into the buses etc. No garages, remember - they couldn't get planning permission! (I checked)
I know the road. It is very busy.
ReplyDeleteMy own drive is a shared one. But the driveway is in the centre. So half each. Which makes it narrower. But easier.
We manoeuvre onto a very quiet road. Parked cars more of a problem than traffic.
So I reverse up to make exit swift in the mornings..
And yes, Anon. We do all have automatic gearbox. Makes it easier, for sure.
"But they are now also being promoted by yet another estate agent - which specialises in marketing properties intended for buy-to-let.
ReplyDeleteCan multiple occupancy and asylum-seekers be far behind?"
Precisely. And with no unit carspaces available, what else but multi can they mean?
Multiple occupancy and asylum seekers may be the only game in town. Seems housing is in a bit of trouble here and in the US - builders can't flog what they have got. HMG blethers about housing starts but is trying to push on string. Won't and can't happen.
ReplyDeleteUs oldies can't flog our overpriced pile, there are no nice bungalows near shops/doctor/buses and the young crop have McJobs cutting hair and pouring coffee on zero or hourly contracts or benefits and no serious money or prospect of money.
The architects tell us the problem is not a shortage of houses - the number/capita is going up along with population. The problem (according to the architects) is second homes, homes left empty and letting - the BTL game. Add to this our industrial policy which leaves good jobs at the top, lousy jobs at the bottom and not much in between and housing is going to be a problem. The BTL boom and lack of any industrial policy screwed up the housing market.
Housing as investment not living in is the problem. Rachel may fix that if she has the courage. A problem that will only get worse until my executors (and yours) have to auction the place off for what they can get. Make a nice HMO though.
Another angle - farms being run at a loss hoping the land will be zoned for residential use is blocking younger people entering farming.
DeleteOf piste but just got new smart meter from BG. Vast improvement on old one .
ReplyDeleteThough ignorance of law no defence - unless supported by man with gifted £20000 clothing.
What next - keep digging in swamp!!!!
Apropos our favourite Chancellor.
ReplyDeleteHow many licences to rent get 'forgotten' either by one's agent or oneself? All seems a bit of a slack system to me. Estate agents and lawyers and politicians being the most upstanding citizens anyone ever knew, but 'mistakes' happen - too often!
Couldn't run a bath.
It's a bit of a scam, the selective licensing.
ReplyDeleteI need to prod a council about one that's been in play for pushing 4 years now. I've diligently filled all the forms, paid my fee, whereupon it all got forgotten for a couple of years.
The council obviously got a kick the other year, as it was remembered, and then back into a process of more forms, followed by evidencing I'd already paid, then it all went quiet again.
Reeves' troubles has the theme from Jaws playing in my head, so maybe I need to go prod them now.
So I have some sympathy for her, and really, The Party of Perfectly Upright Morals and Ethics ought to have gone through everything and everyone prior to getting in power, otherwise that's just asking for problems. If you run on a platform of unassailable probity, your bins will be getting rummaged through for evidence otherwise.