Name: 3 Bleamoor cottages, or “Britain’s loneliest home”.
Age: About 80 years old.
Description: “Exciting renovation project in a stunningly beautiful location.”
Sounds like estate agent speak. Guess why.
Because it is? Courtesy of Fisher Hopper, of Bentham, North Yorkshire.
So we’re talking about a property for sale? Yes, a former railway worker’s cottage in the Yorkshire Dales.
Sounds lovely. But presumably “exciting renovation project” means it’s falling down? Not falling down exactly, but definitely what you might call a project.
How big a project? It hasn’t been lived in for a while. There are signs of damp, the paint is peeling off, not sure I’d trust the floorboards. Oh, and there’s no mains electricity or water. Or sewerage.
I see. And the beautiful location? The views over the moors and up Whernside are stunning. So peaceful, too.
Just how peaceful? The nearest road is a 20-minute hike away. There is a track, potentially passable in a 4×4, but that would have to be negotiated with the landowner.
Go on then: how much? This is the good news: the price has been reduced by 50 grand, to £250,000.
They can’t sell it then? The “Britain’s loneliest home” tag probably isn’t helping. The agents point out that the cottage is on the route of the popular Three Peaks Challenge, and that might offer commercial opportunities.
Such as? I don’t know, turning it into a bunkhouse perhaps, or an Airbnb. It’s also close to the Ribblehead viaduct so you might get the odd railway enthusiast passing by.
I’m just thinking about winter. It could be worse – on the edge of a crumbling cliff, for example. Coastal erosion is now a common reason for properties not selling. In Seaton in Devon, for example, and on the Suffolk coast.
Better to be lonely than in the sea, I guess. Or haunted. A 2018 study suggested that a ghost could knock 17% – or nearly £40,000 – off the average UK property price. Perhaps you’d be interested in Zorro Ranch in New Mexico, though?
Sounds lovely. How much? $18m.
Hmmm, bit over my budget. It does come with 7,500 acres, an airstrip, stables and multiple properties. And it was originally priced at $27.5m.
Why the massive drop? Erm … might have something to do with the previous owner.
Go on … Jeffrey Epstein.
Ew! No thanks. Quite.
Do say: “The property presents an interesting investment opportunity.”
Don’t say: “I think they left a ‘k’ out of the middle of Bleamoor.”
