"What downturn?" asks Jasper Conran. His Chiswick Mall (those nice ones by the river... occasional flooding, a few good pubs, huge bay windows, views over an island) house has recently sold for £12.5m, breaking its own record (£7.25m) as the biggest Chiswick deal ever. Walpole House is set back from the road... it's an ex-home for vagrant girls and an ex-boys' school (the model, apparently, for Miss Pinkerton's Academy). Conran bought it just two years ago. Asking prices in Chiswick have been hit harder than most. According to Land Registry documents Conran sold the house on May 30.

Technorati Tags: celebrity, London, property, real estate

The two-bedroom apartment above The Travel Bookshop - inspiration for and important location in Notting Hill - is on the market. Owned by the vendor, author and publisher (and bookshop owner) Sarah Anderson since 1981, it has its own front door, a good location on Blenheim Crescent and an eccentric feature window... a kitchen window looking down into the bookshop's skylight, giving a view of daytime browsers. It's with KFH, here... offers in excess of £899,950.

Technorati Tags: London, property, real estate

Apparently, there's this thing, where somebody sells a house to somebody else who buys it. Used to happen a lot. Here's one for sale. It's a three-bedroom end-of-row on Portobello Road, and it comes complete with a gallery space on the ground and lower ground floors. The space could be rented out, kept, or even converted. But the house is more interesting than that. Designed by Meadowcroft Griffin in 2004, it won a Conservation Commendation at the 2006 RIBAs, and it's bold inside and out, with the "good light" distributed throughout, rather than reserved for the gallery spaces. It's with The Modern House Estate Agents, with a guide price of £2.25m.

Technorati Tags: architecture, London, property, real estate

Forty million pounds of it, according to this. The property's in Holland Park, it was once the Burmese Embassy, it's been a home for the blind, by the end of 2008 it's likely to be one of the UK's most talked about trophy homes. Cowell is the latest celeb - after everybody's favourite estate agent - to extend downwards. Plans include an underground swimming pool and car park, and will comprise 21,000 sq ft.

Going underground [September 18, 2007]

Technorati Tags: celebrity, London, property, real estate

An interesting Merryn newsletter, on developer scams, buy-to-let gullibility, the Batoum Gardens house (tasty) heading to auction and what a central London agent let drop recently:

One agent caught off his guard told me a few weeks ago that going on his experience prices are already off 10-15% in some areas.

It's an interesting read. Catch it here.

Technorati Tags: London, property, real estate

The Telegraph takes a peak inside Chiswick's Oddfellows Hall... a Victorian building, built by the masons, and featuring four entrances and four addresses. It's been used as a wedding venue and an artist's studio, before the current owner - an estate agent/property developer - snapped it up for £385,000 in 2002 (I know, I know) and gave it a radically modern re-fit. Now it's all plasma screen in the bathroom ceiling, under-floor heating and cinema rooms. What's it doing in the Telegraph? It's for rent... £3,900 a month, from Featherstone Leigh. I can't find Japanese water feature nor wet room of it on the FL website, but luckily you can see more pictures here.

Technorati Tags: London, property, real estate

An Acton man has been put on the sex offenders register for seven years after being found guilty of wiring a camera between his bedroom and the communal bathroom, so that he could watch his flatmates [not pictured] showering. His plan was apparently scuppered when one resident discovered a lens in the wall, and followed a wire up the outside of the building to the man's attic room.

[via Londonist]

Technorati Tags: London

According to a survey by Savills, the following addresses are potential candidates for future primeness. The important driver is an influx of professionals combined with nice existing stock, preferably Victorian or Edwardian homes. The advantages to being "prime"? If you've been reading the Rat and Mouse at all over the last few years you'll know that prime London tends to outgrow the rest of London, indeed the rest of the UK. So here goes:

• Tooting ("the new Notting Hill")
• White City
• East Acton
• Tulse Hill
• Camberwell
• Fortis Green
• Finchley
• Brondesbury
• Willesden Green
• Cricklewood

[via the Times]

Technorati Tags: London, property, real estate

Once home to Biba creator Barbara Hulanicki, this 4-story townhouse in Kensington Park Road still features the odd nod to the fashion icon, even though she hasn't lived there since the 1980s. Check out the kitchen units... hmm. It's with Foxtons and it ain't cheap... this big house (with a garden and conservatory) is listed at £3.4m, here. Click through to the particulars for a cornucopia of photografia.

If these walls could talk... Derek Jarman edition [September 6, 2007]

Technorati Tags: London, property, real estate

Monevator.com is an interesting new personal finance blog with a healthy distrust of the finance industry and an emphasis on personal responsibility. Here, you'll find an examination of the relative costs of buying versus renting in the W6 neighbourhood. It's a good read, and the end result suggests there's little value in buying. However, variables that are harder to quantify and calculate include the freedom to turn a house into home exactly the way you want, and - of course - the market. Certainly, it's fair to say residential properties boom days are likely to be (ought to be) over for the immediate future. But mortgages last longer than the immediate future... and although house price crashes and negative equity have been realities, it's difficult to find a full mortgage term in which properties haven't been a sound investment.

Technorati Tags: London, property, real estate