Not much of a commute for somebody with £4.5m to spend on this remarkable Sir Christopher Wren-designed tower in the heart of the City. It's over ten - yes, ten - floors, with a lift and a spiral staircase to get you up and down. At the very top... a balcony with 360 degree views, including St Paul's. Completely unique, and the Rat and Mouse's favourite London property this year. Particulars here.

Technorati Tags: property, real estate

An interesting piece here on the Primelocation blog. Jennifer Warner attended the launch reception for Central Square - 170 apartments in a good location in Clerkenwell with underground parking - and reports...

Between wine, canapés and viewings the prospective buyers – of all ages and nationalities – quizzed the selling agents. Then like the bear pit of a Wall Street trading floor, they started to buy. With two-bedroom apartments starting at £575,000 this is not a purchase to be bought in a hurry, but a buzz of chatter on the phones to banks or loved ones ensued and deposits of £2,000 per reservation were paid on credit cards.

Thirty-seven apartments were apparently reserved in four hours. That's 22%. Good? Indifferent?

Technorati Tags: property, real estate

It's a £5.5m property, very possibly one of these, and the two singers are said to be about to go head-to-head for it.

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Yes, according overseas property portal HomesGoFast's director Nick Marr, who points to rapid rises in property prices in California's Silicon Valley and draws comparisons with the London Tech City initiative, occupying...

... the area of East End between Old Street and the Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park in Stratford. Companies that are committed to investing into the area include Cisco Systems, Facebook, Google, Intel Corporation, McKinsey & Company and Vodafone.

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It's a four-storey house in Sidney Grove, Islington, with four bedrooms and a decent roof terrace, and the vendor's none other than fun-loving model and actress A.T. Titmuss chose Foxtons, and the property's listed here, with a guide price of £850,000. Judging by the photos, Titmuss hasn't been living there for a while, but has been renting to a tidy and minimalist small brown bear pictured below.

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Seven days to remove all Let By, Managed By and Sold By signs... that's the message in Tower Hamlets Council's latest missive to estate agents. Over at Estate Agent Today, Jamie Blake of the council is quoted thus:

Tower Hamlets will soon be welcoming hundreds of thousands of visitors as part of London 2012, and we want to ensure that the borough looks its best.

So covering it where possible isn't an option?

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Good God... a prominent gay man celebrated by the Daily Mail? He must have done something exceptional. Ah yes, he's made lots of money from residential property. He bought a house in Clerkenwell for £1.2m 18 months ago, and has just sold it for £5.065m. (He also like chasing foxes and hates modern art, which helps.) The property story is quite remarkable, though... a daring refurb, dinner parties with politicians and Joan Collins, a prison door to a bedroom. It also shows the apparent randomness of the estate agent's valuation, which it pertains to an expensive and unique property. His Currell agent told him to take an offer of £3.5m back in the summer.  More here.

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The fifth new London office this year, no less. It's due to open in Clerkenwell on November 6, and expect the usual 0% commission deal to new clients, to help them stock their windows.

Another new Foxtons this weekend [October 1, 2010]
Foxtons, gayness, money... the story with everything [September 28, 2010]
It's a Foxtons world; we just live in it [September 13, 2010]

Technorati Tags: property, real estate

Heron Tower (110 Bishopsgate) is apparently now officially taller than Tower 42's 183m. It will eventually reach 246m into the sky, taller even than 1 Canada Square.

Technorati Tags: architecture, development, London, property, real estate

This counts as "news", in my book. The Barbican boasts 69 new apartments, after a conversion of City University business school offices in residential use. Okay... you could argue that these aren't "original"... they might provide living inside a visionary 60s block, but they're not the 60s vision of living. Doesn't seem to be putting off the buyers, apparently, some of whom are said to be trading sideways from inside the Barbican. But check out the prices:

Expect to pay £380,000 for a studio with a flip-down bed, and up to £1.87 million for a three-bedroom duplex.

Now check out the apartments.

Technorati Tags: London, property, real estate