It’s been a while since I’ve been on here. It isn’t because I wasn’t interested, it was more to do with the lack of time.
It seems odd to even be here now. To be honest, time is at both a premium and a luxury at the same time. I, like most of you, am limited to staying in a lot because of the Coronavirus outbreak. I feel that I have both all the time in the world, but also not a minute to spare.
Anyway, I’ve been watching a fair bit of telly, and that rots the brain. That is, unless you count all the really good stuff, such as The End of the F***ing World on Channel 4. It got me thinking about houses again. Interesting houses. Mainly because it is so expertly styled, and the locations manager had every single place it used bang on.
Ignoring the bit that ruined the first season for me (the brief appearance of a Borough of Swale street sign, appearing in the story long before they arrive in what us locals all knew to be Sheppey), I was taken by where the houses were that they used for the central characters’ homes. I haven’t actually got round to investigating it yet – again, time is very much of the essence – but I did start thinking about where bad murders happen, and on googling the news I decided to look up murders in St Albans.
The search typically showed up something horrid. A news story about a neighbour dispute that ended up with a mild mannered woman stoving another mild mannered woman’s head in with a shovel in broad daylight after years of pettiness between the two. Turned out it happened in Welwyn Garden City, and made the news because of the location of the local Crown Court – St Albans.
On looking into WGC as I will now call it (I am refusing to call it William G. Cewart), the houses there are absolutely delightful. New towns normally have a bad rep. Milton Keynes – roundabouts and anti-social behaviour. Telford – Cathedral City cheese (even though it isn’t a city). Ebbsfleet Garden Village – just row upon row of bland houses with a chain pub for company. Welywn Garden City – bloody hell. It is beautiful.
Take a look at this for example. You don’t get this in Telford.
This is on the market for £775k. That’s a lot of money, but given that this will get you four bedrooms, and loads of character, if you have that sort of money, you’d do well to buy this. It needs a few quid spending as well – but it would need to be spent sympathetically.
Inside much of the property remains unchanged since the 1930s, when this was built.
So that’s a nice house. It turns out that the house was authorised by the city’s planner Louis De Soissons, as an antidote to the general neo-Georgian plan for the town. The architect, Paul Mauger, was not a famous architect during his prime. But he designed this, and lived in it. It used to look like this. Only in colour.
The house is important enough to have been Grade II listed – which means that whoever buys it will have to be in love with it – you can’t muck around with it too much, but why would you want to? It has a fabulous mature garden to the rear. It’s a house you can imagine spending the last of those inter-war years in, and then feeling at home throughout austerity, the sixties and the seventies. You can imagine all of that, but it still feeling modern, different, interesting.
The excellent https://newtownherts.weebly.com/blog/architect-of-the-week-paul-mauger (I’ve been off here that long I can’t remember how wordpress shortens links, and no, don’t @ me), tells his story better than I ever could. He also did modern churches, without going completely into the modernist style. That’s another interest of mine, a story for another time.
So.
Why should I buy this house?
Good question. Chances are if you’re here you’re a friend of mine IRL, and I know most of you don’t have that sort of cash. But… If you’re not a friend of mine IRL, and you do have that sort of money, you’re getting a piece of history, in a really nice part of the world, and it is cheaper than London. And you can be in London Kings Cross in half an hour. You also probably won’t feel commuter guilt. Being a new town (well, a classic new town), it is not steeped in locals hating incomers, or at least shouldn’t be. You’ll probably make friends on the train and on the school run.
Why shouldn’t I buy this house.
Come on mate! I am not answering that because that could prejudice the sale to whomever wants to buy it. I would though ask my solicitor to check the details of the leasehold. Odd to see a house on a leasehold basis, you’ll be wanting to check the length of term, and any particular service charge oddities (NB – I’ve not seen this lease, but some leases from a long time ago contain odd clauses which double the payment every decade, meaning eventually the plot is worthless).
Oh, and one other thing. If you can’t afford to do the work, properly, don’t buy it. You’ll ruin it.
What’s the town like then?
Well, it is both a Garden City and a New Town – so my use of both “City” and “town” in this article is entirely justifiable. It is pretty affluent – the house prices should tell you that, but remember you can buy a £1m house in the Medway Towns these days so that should not be your marker of the quality of life. Of course, affluence in itself is not a good thing – you need to think about the bigger picture. Employment, and good quality skilled employment is suprisingly abundant for a town so close to London. ICI may have closed its chemical plant, but Tesco took it over and moved their head office function there.
If I was to summarise the information from the last census etc, it’s a town with a younger, well educated population, with higher than normal employment.
It returns a Tory MP. Grant Shapps.
So what’s the boozer like?
I haven’t had time to look, but if you buy this house you won’t have the money. You’ll be on the roof terrace drinking craft beer you’ve brewed yourself in the garage. You’ll call it Goat No1. Or Maugersmiths.
Where do I find out more?
Do what I did. Rightmove. Or, contact the agent directly – they’ve done a great job of the write up in all honesty, and it is Putterills, on 01707 393333. Say I sent you (and if they ask, tell them I am happy to work for them for a percentage).
That's an Interesting House 