Four-bedroom village homes to renovate

I was watching A Place in the Sun last night and thinking, blimey, that looks easy. You rock up to that modern apartment you bought in Spain, unpack a couple of boxes and then find a bar.
It's not like that in wreck buying land. On, no, no, no.
By way of example, here are my wreck picks for this week. Both family-size detached properties in village locations, but carrying different levels of renovation baggage. 
Starting here with this very lovely stone farmhouse, in Cumbria's Great Strickland, close to Penrith.

Grade II listed, it has well-shaped, good size rooms, four bedrooms, gorgeous gardens, off-road parking and a beautiful country village location. So far, so yummy.
Downstairs is a large through lounge, separate sitting or dining room, kitchen, walk-in pantry, good-size utility room and two generous halls.

Upstairs four bedrooms and a bathroom. One bedroom has a worrying-looking ceiling but otherwise all very reasonable-looking for a full renovation and update job.

Which is why the cash buyers only restriction is a little concerning, perhaps some elements of that renovation would scare off mortgage lenders? Regardless, you're going to need access to a serious pot of ready cash to be able to buy and do up Town Head Farm house.
There's a pretty walled garden to the front, large side and rear gardens, all enclosed by mature trees and shrubs, and off-road parking (accessed by shared drive). And the village pub is just across the green.

On the market through Dave Britton Estates with a £360k guide price (cash buyers). Details, floor plans and video on the estate agent's site here and on Rightmove here.

I was in two minds about my second pick. It's been on my 'possible' list for a few weeks because I couldn't decide whether it was lovely or ugly. I think we'll just settle on interesting.
Up for auction next week, Shalom is in the Powys village of Llangynog, around 10km from the English border. Another village location with great views and easy access to spectacular countryside.

I'm sure when this was built it made quite the Grand Designs mark in the village. Super '70s shaping, projecting concrete, big windows, mixing of materials. A James Bond block of building drama, hidden in its landscape, with a built-in garage for the Aston Martin to screech out of.  
This living room is proper mid-century styling and crying out for shaggy rugs and a cocktail bar.

But at some point James' granny moved in...

The ground floor has two bedrooms and a bathroom, a large utility room and the integrated garage. The first floor has two or three bedrooms and a bathroom, that through lounger/diner and a large kitchen.

Outside is another, detached garage/workshop, parking, drive (there's space for up to seven cars overall) and large - but very overgrown - gardens.
The property obviously needs a lot of work, it's stood empty for long enough for water to get in and gardens to encroach, but for some one who likes their cars and their privacy, there's massive potential here.
Up for auction on February 25th through Town and Country auctions with a guide price of £255k (plus the 5% plus vat Buyers Premium). Details and more pictures on the agent's website here and on Rightmove here.   
Not quite the Elrod House in Diamonds are Forever (nor hopefully with its menace and misogyny), but super cool.
 

Two southern 'wrecks' with potential

Have I mentioned that I'm writing a book about 18th century women journalists? I've a way to go yet, but my reason for raising it is that, because of the book, I found myself in a webinar about research at Chawton House, one of Jane Austen's* haunts.
Which is my very convoluted introduction to why I decided to look for wrecks to show you around Chawton, Steventon and other Austen Hampshire locations.
Anyway, that was a mistake.
Oh my Lordy, Lord you southerners pay megabucks for your homes!! 
Those Austen villages are way too London-accessible for affordability, and the bigger locations - Bath, Southampton, Winchester were equally costly and wreck-free. 
Which is by way of an apology from me for giving up on the Austen thingy and simply showing you two interesting southern picks.
Although I will start with this one in Southampton, where Jane did live for a time.

Two reception rooms, kitchen and hall downstairs, three bedrooms and bathroom upstairs. The front room and main bedroom are particularly gorgeous with those sweeping curved bays. 

The third bedroom and bathroom small but not massively so - although I'm choosing not to show you a picture of the bathroom; you might be eating you lunch.
Good size gardens and drive and all of it in the posh and green suburb of Upper Shirley.

Clearly in need of a lot of work, which is one reason it's up for auction rather than straightforward sale. And remember that means a chunky auction premium added to the sold price.
However, lots of potential here and really well-shaped and attractive property.
On the market through Town and Country Auctions with a guide price of £275k. More details on the agent's site here and on Rightmove here.
My second pick is also up for auction and, unusually for 'Wreck', a semi- rather than detached house, but like the Southampton house, there's something really attractive about it's shape and look.

This is in Essex rather than Jane's Hampshire, but I think Ms Austen could vibe an Essex girl attitude.
Three storeys - the top floor being two attic rooms that, well, need a lot of work shall we say?

Below that is the first floor with three good size bedrooms (no bathroom), and the ground floor has two reception rooms, hall, large kitchen (and walk-in pantry) and the shower room.

Outside are beautiful large gardens and basically plant a few roses around those doors and you've got yourself a very Austen, gorgeous English country cottage.
Obviously apart from all those pre-rose planting repairs, renovations and unexpected scary bits.

The house is one of just two farm cottages down a private lane in the little Essex village of Chignall Smealy, about four miles from Chelmsford.
Up for sale through Clive Emson with a guide price of £285k, plus the buyers premium. Details and more pictures on the agent's site here, and on Rightmove here.

*No, Jane Austen isn't one of the women I'm writing about, but she was influenced by some of them. Chawton House has an amazing library of early women's writing, plus talks published to YouTube and a thriving academic residency programme. Which may or may not be anything like this one...

Houses with attached barns to renovate

OML it’s windy! I live in an on-the-edge (in all ways) bit of the UK so we do get all the weather all the days, but this week’s dog walks have been a real test of mine and the hound’s core strength.
Anyway I’m home, with the radio, hot coffee and a sleeping greyhound, and ready to show you my picks for this week - two cozy-potential wrecks for weathering storms.
Starting with this super-cute cottage in the Scottish Highlands.
Scotland does weather, and its Highlands and Islands homes are classically wide and squat, solid and hunkered in their exposed landscape.
What they do less well is “modernising” those homes. Like this one, replacing heavy wooden doors with plastic ones, covering permeable stone walls with moisture-trapping concrete render. It’s something I’ve been banging on about through two decades of 'Wreck'.
The cottage is in a small crofting community, just outside the small port town of Aultbea. It is in an absolutely beautiful part of the world, with views of the sea but up a hill and along a lane from it.

Downstairs is the living room, separate dining room, galley kitchen and rear porch. Upstairs two loft bedrooms and a bathroom.

The rooms downstairs would benefit from some reshaping, plenty of scope to merge the dining room and kitchen for example, even if you didn't want to integrate that almost-attached stone bothan (bothy).

Outside, as well as that bothan there's a less solid-looking byre and the property comes with half-an-acre of land plus small garden areas to the front and back and parking space. 
All in all, a gorgeous detached cottage with outbuildings and land, on the market at offers over £150k.
Details and more pictures through the agent, Bell Ingram, on their site here and on Rightmove here.

My next pick is also a chunky stone house with a barn and views, but 352 miles south of Aultbea.
This three-storey house in the Lake District is in the centre of the quiet village of Helton, a mile from popular Askham and around five miles from Penrith.

The house is on the market for cash buyers only given the "renovation" that needs doing, but more probably given the unlikelihood of getting a mortgage on that undercroft/basement area. This property needs a buyer and a builder who knows what they're doing.

But crikey it has potential. I'm completely in love with its gardens and the views from the rear are just gorgeous.

The ground floor has a large kitchen, through lounge and hall. Upstairs are three bedrooms (one quite small) and a bathroom.

The basement has two big rooms/stores, accessed from those garden doors and from the kitchen.
I'll be honest, that basement scares me, not because of the work needed but because I've watched way too many films starring evil basements.
There's also a large - very large - double-height attached barn and, all in all, a lot of walls for the money.

On the market with a (cash only) guide price of £400k through Britton Estates. Details and more pictures and video on the agent's site here and on Rightmove here.
I was thinking I might finish with a scary basement video, but that wouldn't be fair to the property - or to you, perhaps. Instead, I'll finish with the magnificent Kate out on the wily, windy Moors.

And, for Wuthering Heights fans everywhere, a reminder that the 2026 Most Wuthering Heights Day will take place across dozens of locations globally in July. Get your red frock out : )