Two rural churches and a cottage to renovate

My previous post is feeling rather flippant today. Not least because, rather than find an isolated cottage away from people generally, I'm worrying more about the need to stay away from people I love - my elderly mum with chronic illnesses; my brother with cancer.
Suddenly, how we choose to live together over the coming days is more important than finding somewhere to live apart.
Here are three properties with potential to inspire - or distract - us all from these darkening times.
My first choice is the very pretty St Edmunds church, above and below, in the East Yorkshire coastal village of Fraisthorpe.

There are no internal photos - which would normally put me off featuring a property - but the prettiness and the deadline (final offers by March 20th) mean I wanted to show you it.
The property, one of the Church of England's current disposals, comes with permissions already in place to turn the Grade II listed church into a two-bedroom house.
And the guide price of offers over £100k is attractive for a detached property in this location (though you'll want to check there no plans to build on that field in front of you).

On the market through Dee Atkinson & Harrison, details and more pictures here and here.

Another church next - this time in the North Yorkshire National Park village of Chopgate.

Again, it comes with planning permission in place to turn it into a two-bedroom home, however this time there are restrictions - holiday accommodation only, you can't do it up to live there (is it just me who finds it bizarre that the body charged with protecting the national park stops people actually living there but is happy for any number of people to visit?).

Also, if someone could tell me why there's a canoe in the chapel, I'd be grateful?
Hopefully it's not a flood warning...
Regardless of the limitations, it is a very pretty chapel in a very lovely part of northern Yorkshire.
On the market through Roseberry Newhouse with a guide price of £80k. (Sketchy) details and more pictures here and here.

And finally, I love this little cottage in the Cairngorms. Lovely shape, nice big garden space, and it already has planning permission to replace that dodgy side extension.

Clearly work to be done.
And I can see why the agent didn't take pictures of the view from the from the front:

But none-the-less a really sweet, three-bedroom house with potential, and in a lovely bit of our world.
On the market through Masson Cairns at £149,950. Details and more pictures here and here.

Wrecks for eco-warriors and virus escapers

I'm currently living and working in York. That handsome medieval city that was home to the UK's first Coronovirus victim, flooded streets - and that plague of African locusts is probably just around the equatorial corner. 
There's a pretty biblical feel to the news nowadays.
All of which has led me to thinking about living a more isolated life, and I started looking for wrecks that were closer to nature and further from people. Here are three suggestions.
Sent to me by reader Tim, Changue Farm bungalow is pretty much land rather than a wreck. Well, clearly a wreck, but not an interesting enough building to renovate.

A two-bedroom Dumfries bungalow with holes in the walls. It comes with planning permission to replace it with a  three-bedroom detached house (or whatever you're able to renegotiate with planning).
But, the big but, it also comes with five acres of land, stunning sea and land views - and your own bit of the foreshore.

It's four miles from the nearest village - Port William, and 13 from the nearest town - Wigtown.
The bungalow's neighbour - the main farmhouse with 15 acres of land and its own slice of the foreshore is currently under offer, and you'll want to keep an eye on that, but there'd be more than enough land and privacy between you and your larger neighbour to create your eco-escape.
And, even if you're replacing the bungalow with a new build, at offers over £135k it's a bargain parcel of land, open views and seafront.
On the market through Savills. Details and more pictures here and here.
In a similar vein, this pretty bizarrely-shaped house-that-Jack-built in Kenmare, Ireland, is probably something you'd want to start over on rather than renovate.

However, it too comes with a big parcel of land (over seven acres!) and only one near-neighbour.
There is planning permission in place to renovate and extend it, and the cottage hasn't been lived in since 2003, so a fair bit of work to do.
But the land and space is what matters here. Water comes from the mountain stream and your land is in hiker's paradise Black Valley. Gorgeous.

And the very best bit? All of that land and house for 99,000 Euro  - just £84.5k.
Those crazy-low Irish prices again.
On the market through Sherry Fitzgerald, details and more pictures here.
And finally, pricier than my other two picks but that's because you get a whopping 51 acres of land with your run-down farmhouse.

The three-bedroom house is surrounded by its land; has its own private water supply, and a seven-acre chunk of woodland bordering a stream.
It's a quarter of a mile to its nearest neighbours and six from the nearest town (Newcastle Emlyn) and, while the house and its outbuildings (there are lots of them...) are in various stages of disrepair, there's also more than enough room to live and work in a multitude of eco-considerate ways.

Pantmelyn Farm is on the market through Dai Lewis at £450k. Details and lots more pictures here.