Episode 48 Homes Under the Hammer

The world of property provides an ever-changing and challenging

environment, which really fascinates me and Dion.

Yes, but there's one key principle - get it for the best price possible.

But that's not always as easy as it seems.

No, but one way you could stack the odds in your favour is by going to

your local auction house.

Buying at auction is a very popular way to approach things.

Every month, millions and millions of pounds is spent at auction.

So, with all that auction action going on,

what inspired the buyers on today's show?

I'm in Newcastle-under-Lyme

and the decor in this three-bed house takes me back to my youth.

Wow. That wallpaper is wacky, wacky, wacky.

There's less of the zigzags and more of the thin blue line at this former

police office in Dudley.

The address?

999 Letsby Avenue!

And there's dated decor aplenty for Lucy at this four-bed house in

Berkhamsted...in a good way.

Cornicing, coving, lovely, lovely stairs.

Wow.

All these properties have been sold at auction, and we'll find out who

bought them and what they paid when they went under the hammer.

This is Newcastle-under-Lyme in Staffordshire.

There was, of course, a castle

and it would have been new in the 12th century, when it was built.

Under-Lyme probably refers to the Forest of Lyme

that supposedly covered the area in medieval times.

It's been a market town for over 800 years and still today the market is

open six days a week.

We've headed north to the village of Chesterton.

Well, just ten minutes' drive from the centre of Newcastle-under-Lyme

is the property I'm here to see.

Ex-local-authority house, guide price £80,000, three-bed, detached,

but with a strange sort of space at the side of it.

Hmm.

So, what have we got? A nice big entrance area.

Straight away it looks like it could do with a bit of

modernisation.

Things like a new banister on there.

And just...I don't know... but it's fine.

Nice little storage area under the cupboard there. And...wow.

Living room to the right-hand side

and that wallpaper is wacky, wacky, wacky.

It's like those old televisions, when they went slightly wrong.

That does strange things to your eyes!

But it's a good-sized front lounge,

a bit of storage space under the stairs there.

And then through to the rear of the property,

a little sort of pathway through there

to a sort of utility area and an old larder in there.

I mean, that's exactly the sort of thing you get

in these old or ex-authority houses.

All these walls - no stud partitions there.

It's all solid brick and that's really good.

And also, you get space.

This is the kitchen. It's a real family kitchen,

clearly in need of new units and all that kind of stuff.

But enough space for a kitchen table there, and it's good,

it's a great start.

# So far, so good... #

So, upstairs, what delights are in store?

Lots of light flooding onto the landing from the little window,

which is good. You've got your bathroom and loo up here.

The bathroom suite!

Well, definitely a little bit dated.

New suite in there - white, lovely, new -

it would be absolutely gorgeous.

You've got three bedrooms,

boxroom there, and then through into the second large bedroom.

And again, really well proportioned.

In need of, obviously, modernisation.

But lots of space to work with.

A few cracks here and there.

I don't think there's anything untoward. Yeah, great little house.

My love affair with ex-local-authority houses

might be clouding my thinking process when it comes to the cracks.

This area does have a mining history and, come to think of it,

maybe we should have another look outside,

because it's not what's there that worries me, it's what's not there.

When you come out here you sort of are reminded of something I noticed

when I walked up to the property.

Originally, this would have been a semidetached,

and yet half the property, the one at the side of it there,

has been knocked down at some point. Now, that poses a lot of questions,

uh...why...being the most obvious one.

Is it something ominous?

# Here comes that sinking feeling... #

It certainly would be worth trying to find out why the other house was

demolished. But it's not necessarily a bad thing,

as the work should have been carried out in compliance with the council's

building regulation department to make sure that this property is safe

and the former party wall, which is now the new external wall,

is watertight and properly insulated.

The biggest plus is, of course, that we now have a detached house,

which can only make it more valuable and attractive to buyers.

We've asked along an agent from the auction house who sold it to get his

opinion on the house.

First impressions are that the property needs a full renovation,

redecoration throughout, and generally upgrading.

And once all the work was complete, what could the house,

guided at £80,000, be sold for?

I would expect the property to achieve somewhere in the region of

£130,000.

And for the long-term investor, what about the rental market?

Once renovated,

the property would achieve on the rental market

somewhere in the region of £600 to £625 per calendar month.

Well, it's a good, solid house,

with lots of space for a relatively low guide price.

Yeah, an interesting opportunity.

Let's see who fancied it when it went under the hammer.

Guide price on this has been increased.

What shall I say? 70 to start.

Got to be that, I think. Looking for 70 to get it going.

70 bid. Thank you. At £70,000.

Looking for 72 now. At 70,000.

Looking for 72.

72. 74. 76.

I'll go in ones, if it helps. The bid's at £76,000.

77. At 77.

78. At 78.

79.

80?

Half. He's saying 79 and a half.

80. Another half?

No. 80,000 on my right, then.

At 80,000. Another 500 anywhere else?

If not, £80,000 for the first time.

£80,000 for the second time.

Third and final time, £80,000.

Your lot, sir, well done.

The successful bidder, who paid bang on the guide price at 80,000,

was Martin.

Martin is the director of a road marking company and does property

development as a hobby.

I met up with him to find out what he had planned for this interesting

former semidetached property.

-Martin, good to meet you.

-And you.

-Congratulations.

-Thank you.

-Tell me why you wanted to buy this house.

I owned some land next to it...

-Literally next to it?

-Yeah, next door.

My intention is to knock this one down and build a block.

-Wow!

-A block of four.

Right. Have you got any experience of that in this area or...?

Yeah, I bought a house on the corner behind us

and I got planning permission to build three in the garden there.

I bought a ransom strip off of this house,

so as I could put the gardens in.

Just in case anyone doesn't know, what is a ransom strip?

Basically, I needed that piece of land to get planning so as I...

I had to move the houses back off the road to get off-road parking.

-Right.

-So now my intention is to just build this block here,

similar to what I've done there.

And it's called a ransom strip because it intrinsically

wasn't worth as much as you had to pay for it.

That's right, yeah.

Worth much more to you than its intrinsic value.

Yes. It keeps a nice little parcel of rentable properties together then

because I'll have eight in the same block, if you like.

-Right, and you keep them all...

-Yeah.

-..and rent them all out.

Yeah, that's my intention.

How did you settle on this little area?

It was a family friend that was living in the first house and she

was looking to move on.

Thought that there was a possibility of getting planning in the garden.

I bought it from her.

She stayed for another two years

whilst I was trying to get planning and then she moved on.

And it just...by luck, really.

Martin is clearly a patient man.

He's been buying houses and bits of land here since 2008.

He's had his eye on this house for three years.

Meanwhile, with the other parcel of land,

he's spent two years negotiating with the planning department to be

allowed to build three properties there.

Now, of course, he'll have to do it all over again for this part of the

development, because he wants to build four three-bed houses

on this and next door's plots.

So you own the bit of land at the side.

What do you know about what's happening?

It's obviously quite interesting that this was probably a semidetached at one point, was it?

Yeah, I believe that going back...

I'm not sure exactly when it happened but there was a fault that ran through from the mining era.

I believe it was like a drift run all the way through.

So this was knocked down

and a couple more in the local area.

In case you're wondering what was meant by drift,

that's a mining term for a near horizontal passageway

following the coal.

So it suggests that the ground could of course be subject to movement.

A mine report is a must, I reckon.

Most people would probably hear that and run a mile,

as opposed to thinking,

I'll buy more properties right there on top of this drift.

Yeah, I think nowadays with how foundations have come on,

it's just a matter of putting a ring beam foundation down...

What's that?

Not really a floating raft but a ring beam around it,

it has metalwork in it. So it holds it all together.

-Have you made noises with the planners over that?

-No, not yet.

I don't actually believe that it's going to be too much of an issue

-to get planning here.

-Why?

-Because there was a property there before.

And also there's a property here now.

Martin does sound confident.

He also thinks, although he wants to build four houses here,

the local need and demand for housing would go in his favour too.

Just as ever, he's got to be patient.

Probably take four or five months to get planning.

Hopefully, fingers crossed, there won't be too many issues with that.

And then another 6 to 8 months to get them built.

So, what's the construction costs for this?

Well, I've paid 80,000 for the house,

but on the night of the sale, on the addendum,

there was a covenant that only one property could be built here

-if it's knocked down.

-Oh, right.

-Which seemed a bit strange.

So I paid 80,000 for the plot

and then £17,000 to get the covenant lifted.

-So...

-£17,000 extra?

-Yeah.

-To enable you to do what you wanted to do?

-Yeah.

The plot, if you like, and to knock this town is going to stand me at 110,000.

-OK.

-And I'm anticipating putting a block of four up for 200,000.

-It's just a straight through...

-50 each.

-..unit, yeah.

Right. So I'm looking at...

They're going to be about £75,000 to £80,000 and they should be...

They are valued at about 100,000, 110,000.

So, all good on this?

What's your biggest concern? Any major potential hiccups?

Planning, possibly.

But I'm fairly confident that it won't be too much of an issue.

Right. And then plans for any more? Or will that be?

You never know. Keep your eyes open for different opportunities.

-Yeah, brilliant. Well, lovely to meet you.

-And you.

Good luck with it.

There you go. That's a turn-up for the books, isn't it?

The house will probably be knocked down to make room for four

new ones. Obviously,

lots of hurdles to jump over before that actually happens.

But it just shows, thinking outside the box sometimes delivers

some very interesting opportunities. How will it all turn out?

Find out later in the show.

Dudley in the West Midlands was originally a market town

and one of the birthplaces of the Industrial Revolution.

However, Dudley has reinvented itself as a tourist destination,

with fantastic attractions like the Black Country Living Museum,

Dudley Castle and Dudley Zoo.

So, will the property I'm here to see in nearby Netherton have people

flocking to buy it?

So, just three miles outside the centre of Dudley is the lot I'm here to see.

Now, it's something just a little bit different today

for Homes Under The Hammer. It's former police offices.

Semidetached building, over two floors,

with a guide price of £80,000 to £90,000.

The address?

999 Letsby Avenue!

SIREN WAILS

Not really.

Now, stand by, there's going to be a lot of police puns in next few

sentences. Apologies.

Not bad.

We are in through the back door, straight into the kitchen.

And it's...

It's a big kitchen. It's a good-sized kitchen.

The kitchen cupboards look OK, work OK.

Surfaces look fine as well.

You would definitely be able to keep this.

You'd have to obviously repaint and re-tile.

Put some flooring down. But not bad.

There's the stairs up to the first floor

and we are into this large dual-aspect...

what I see as a nice big lounge, dining area,

but you've got signs of office everywhere.

You've got the sockets there.

You've got the office lighting, all the cables are in trunking,

but it really does lend itself to put double doors

just off the dining room out into the back garden.

Let's check out the rest of this place.

The trunking and network cable installation would no doubt be a

huge attraction to someone interested in computer games,

but if left in, I think it would restrict the market appeal.

In fact, it's not only the aesthetics here

that need de-officing.

You might need a change of use

converting this back into residential premises,

so check with the local planners first.

OK, onto the first floor.

And what have we got, then?

We've got a toilet there and another toilet by the side.

And this is why...

One for the ladies and one for the gents.

Knock that wall down, make a nice big family bathroom,

got loads of space to do that there.

And your three bedrooms, you've got one at the front of the property,

a real good-sized bedroom there.

More of a box bedroom at the end.

And in here, we've got a shower.

So if you've got the family bathroom already,

you don't really need that, so you could easily...

There you go. You could easily knock down that wall, and you'd have three

good-sized bedrooms, family bathroom - job done.

A floor-level vent suggests to me that this place was heated by

a duct warm system, which were common back in the '70s.

But I'm guessing it's not in good nick,

judging by the amount of radiators scattered about.

So the central-heating system is on the to-do list.

And the next thing on the to-do list might be to get a mower out.

As you can see, it is a little bit overgrown out the back here,

but there is loads of space and it wouldn't take long,

I think possibly a weekend,

to get this sorted into a really nice family back garden.

You've got all that space in there, all that space out here,

and it's a bit of a sun trap as well.

What more could you ask for?

Well, how about an agent from the auction house that sold the property

to give us his valuations and opinions?

I think the property would appeal to a family to move into or for an

investor to do it up and rent it out to another family.

But I think, ultimately, it's a family home.

So, once refurbished as a family home with central heating,

what would it be worth?

Once refurbished, I'd expect the property to achieve a sales figure

of 125,000 to 130,000.

As a rental, I'd expect it

to achieve £550 to £600 per calendar month.

So, there are loads of obvious signs of this building's past

as a police office. Now, if you look beyond that,

I can see loads of potential for this place to be a really nice family home.

Let's see who spotted that potential when it went under the hammer.

Unfortunately, we didn't capture the bidding for this lot,

but the semi sold for 86 grand to Angela.

She works as a chemical engineer in the oil and gas industry and she has

travelled from her home in Woking to meet me back at her new purchase.

-Angela, nice to meet you.

-Hi, nice to meet you.

-Congratulations.

-Thank you.

-This is a former police office.

-Yes.

-It's not in bad NICK.

-No.

-Did you get it for a STEAL?

It wasn't bad, it wasn't bad.

I apologise. I had to get you out there.

Joking aside, how did you find this and why did you like it?

It was on a list of potentials, quite a long list,

-and it was at the bottom.

-Really?

It was because I didn't actually get to see the inside.

-I came up for a couple of days...

-Are you glossing over some things?

-Did you view the property?

-I viewed the outside.

Just not the inside. The rest of the properties I had a five-page

checklist that I went through but couldn't get in to see this one.

It ticked the boxes for price and the type of work I'd have to do and things like that.

How are you going to manage it, then?

You are down south and this is up north.

Come up and stay a couple of nights at a time, get the inflatable bed out.

There's a lot of rooms in here to stick it.

There's plenty of room and plenty of toilets, so it's fine.

So is it something that you are going to get involved in if you are going to come and stay?

I was planning to do a lot of the work myself but I now

might have to go back to work.

If I'm not working, then I'll do quite a lot of the work.

I'll do plumbing and tiling and painting, that sort of thing.

Oh, so you actually get your hands dirty, get stuck in?

-Yeah, definitely.

-So why did you get into the property world, then?

Well, I had a flat that I had rented out and it needed doing up so I

renovated and quite enjoyed it.

Work was a bit slow so I thought I needed something else to do.

And you found this one. Right, it's yours.

-It is.

-What are you going to do with it?

Turn it back into a nice family home, hopefully.

It has got a commercial feel, it has got an office feel about it.

I'm just going to strip it all back,

probably just skim all the walls, repaint, re-carpet,

put some central heating in, new windows everywhere.

-Yeah.

-And knock a few walls through to make the bathrooms

-into family bathrooms again.

-OK.

So down here, what are you going to do here?

Down here, possibly knock through from the kitchen into the dining area.

-I haven't quite decided on that one yet.

-That is a decent-sized kitchen,

-isn't it?

-It's a good-sized kitchen, it doesn't need it and I am not sure

I want any extra building work if I don't have to,

so I'm in two minds about that.

Now, we do encourage open-plan living here on this show,

but you do have to bear in mind the downsides...

..cooking smells, not to mention the noise from the washing machine,

dishwashers and the clattering of the dishes.

And noisy kids of course, if you've got any.

And that can disturb the Sunday afternoon footy.

So how many bedrooms would you like when it's all completed?

We will have three upstairs

and then this extension can be, potentially, a fourth bedroom.

It would be fine if you had a teenager or elderly parents

and they could have their own nice room with an en suite and separate

access if required as well, so it would make quite a good addition.

Flexible family space that allows teenagers to make as much noise

or mess separately can be a good thing.

It certainly warrants thinking about.

And there is more where that came from.

So what's the...

I'd normally say budget, but what's the BILL going to be?

You can laugh, if you want.

Sorry, carry on.

I am hoping to do it for about 15,000.

With all the windows needing replacing and central heating going in, it might go above that.

Where do you think the majority of that will go?

The bulk is going to be on the windows and the central heating and

obviously flooring is going to be a fair dent in that as well.

But I can do all the painting myself and tiling and things like that,

and my friend is going to do the bulk of the ripping everything out

and building some stud walls and things.

Good man. The windows will cost you a few quid because there are

-not only a lot of them, they're big as well.

-There are lots of big windows.

The place is lovely and light and airy, I love the big window

on the landing, but it's a bit pointless

apart from it being that big.

Yes, so I'll have to get a few quotes in

and hope that somebody comes up trumps on that.

Angela is hoping to get this place licked into shape in

three to four months, depending on how often she can be there.

Her plan is to sell on.

She's already got a price in her head based on

thorough and extensive research. Good girl.

The one next door is for sale.

Is it the same sort of size?

It's the other half of the semi.

-Fantastic.

-It's got a slightly different extension on it

-but it's pretty comparable.

-What kind of spec are you going for?

-Middle, top or bottom?

-Middle, really.

I don't think the area warrants top spec but people like a nice-looking

kitchen and you can spend a bit of money on nice taps and things

-to make it look better.

-In general, when you go to a house,

-the kitchen is the one you look for, isn't it?

-Yes.

Nice clean bathrooms, clean lines.

Kitchens are expensive so people don't want to have to change them

so if you can get a kitchen that most people will like,

it doesn't have to be brilliant, it just has to be good quality.

And will you be going back to the auction rooms very soon?

Oh, as soon as this one goes, I think I will be back in there.

-Really?

-As long as I don't make a loss.

You are going to see how this one goes?

Yeah, I'll see how this one goes but I'll be keeping an eye out for anything suitable in the meantime.

So will you be looking up in the Midlands again for more properties?

Hopefully, next time, I'll find somewhere a bit closer to home.

Yes, that would help.

This is about the closest I could get on my budget.

Angela, I wish you all the best.

-Thank you very much.

-Good luck to you and I hope it all works out.

Thank you very much.

Angela didn't view the property but I think she's got out of JAIL here.

After three to four months' HARD LABOUR,

will this place still be an ARRESTED development?

I'm so sorry, so many puns.

Come back later in the show and you can find out how she gets on.

I'm going back INSIDE.

Still to come - Lucy is through with this layout in Berkhamsted.

Here, and through here is the bathroom and the toilet.

And we will find out if Angela gets off with

GOOD Homes Under The Hammer BEHAVIOUR.

All in all, I'm happy enough with the budget.

It was just north of Newcastle-under-Lyme in Staffordshire,

in the village of Chesterton,

where we first saw a three-bed property that brought new meaning to the term "detached house".

There's something I noticed when I walked up to the property.

Originally, this would have been a semidetached,

and yet half the property, the one at the side of it there,

has been knocked down at some point. Now, that poses a lot of questions.

Why, being the most obvious one.

Is it something ominous?

# But that's just the half of it... #

And it turned out there was a slightly ominous reason that one half of this,

which would have been a semi, had been detached and flattened.

It was due to the unstable ground from mining in the area,

which is something that would concern most people,

but it didn't bother property hobbyist Martin,

who snapped it up for 80,000 quid

as part of the development project he had planned.

But that wasn't the whole story.

# And that's just the half of it... #

I own some land next to it.

-Oh, literally?

-Yeah.

-OK.

-Next door.

My intention is to knock this one down and build a block.

-Wow.

-A block of four.

Have you got any experience of that in this area?

Yeah, I bought a house on the corner behind us,

and I got planning permission to build three in the garden there.

So, this house, or more importantly, the land it was on,

was the final piece in Martin's jigsaw,

to enable his block of four new homes to be built.

And he was confident, with modern foundation methods,

that the ground wouldn't be an issue,

but he did have to sink some more money into the project

to get it off the ground.

There was a covenant that only the one property could be built

-here if it was knocked down.

-Oh, right.

£17,000 to get the covenant lifted.

-So...

-£17,000 extra?

-Yeah.

-To enable you to do what you want to do?

-Yeah.

That was a bit of a downer.

It meant getting this potential plot had cost £97,000,

and he still had demolition and services to sort out

for the four houses he had planned,

even before he added in the build costs.

He hoped to bring the houses in for a total of 300,000,

and he thought he could have them complete in a year.

So, providing planning was granted for the old house, well...

And now, 18 months later, we're back.

So, did it all go to plan?

Well, would you look at that?

What did he end up building?

We were able to fit four three-bedroom properties.

All four houses are identical on the outside,

as is the layout on the inside.

Come in, you got a small hallway,

you've then got a downstairs toilet, cloakroom.

You then come into the lounge.

From the lounge

into a kitchen, like, a little kitchenette-diner.

Upstairs, you've got three bedrooms and a bathroom and shower.

Well, it all looks very smart on the surface,

but what about below the ground?

When we got the mining report, the actual fault is 600 metres down,

so it was quite surprising that all those years ago it had come to the

surface, but it basically runs

all the way through, from here, up the road.

There's a number of houses that have been knocked down over the years

where the fault runs through.

Sounds a bit scary, doesn't it?

But these houses were built with ring beam foundations,

so they'll be able to withstand any ground movement.

So, Martin's confident these houses aren't going anywhere soon.

I had a project manager that works for me that came in

and basically oversaw the project. I was then just coming and going,

keeping my eye on it and making sure everything was going how I wanted it to.

Martin is the managing director of a road marking company.

But having overseen the build of three other properties just over the

fence from here, he's quite an experienced developer by now.

He reckons he spent 120,000 buying the house,

paying the covenant and the demolition costs.

The build itself has come in at about 300,000.

So, the four houses stand me at 420,000.

420,000 means, if I've got my maths right,

it cost Martin £105,000 per house.

But what do two local experts think?

Are these the right type of property for the local market?

First of all, let's ask the agent who saw the lot last time.

Since coming back to the property,

very appealing as soon as you approach the properties.

Very good decision as well, obviously, on this occasion

to demolish the original building, and then, obviously,

fantastic job with the four new properties here.

It's a brand-new build,

and it all works really well.

I like the layout, and it's been finished to a very high standard.

Martin wants to keep these properties and in fact already has tenants

lined up for all four houses.

But with each house costing him £105,000,

were they a good investment?

Well, the agents valued each house at between 120 and 130 grand,

so a potential profit, minus taxes and fees,

of between £60,000 to £100,000 for all four houses.

A good result.

But a rental vehicle is how Martin currently sees the properties.

We would look to place the properties on the market for somewhere in the

region of £575 per calendar month.

I would recommend a rental figure

in the region of £580 per calendar month.

So, the rent that I'm looking for is 775,

but that includes all your bills.

I think if it was on the open market without the bills, then, yeah,

575 is about right.

£575 per calendar month will represent a yield of 6%,

but what's next on Martin's agenda?

I'm 50 this year, so my intention is to go away somewhere different every

month of the year. I've done Cambodia, Vietnam,

Bali, Singapore,

Oman, Switzerland,

Spain and Italy.

And I'm off to Italy again at the beginning of the month.

Nestled in the Chiltern Hills,

Berkhamsted may be typical green and pleasant land,

but it has another green claim to fame.

World-renowned author Graham Greene was born in the historic market town

in 1904 and lived here

until he went to study at Balliol College in Oxford.

So, will the property Lucy is here to see

be something to WRITE home about?

Well, I'm here to see quite a substantial end-of-terrace.

It is situated in the centre of the town.

Now, it's here. Wow.

Look at this.

Quite an impressive Victorian building,

with some absolutely beautiful, intricate brickwork on the outside,

which I love. It's absolutely gorgeous.

Now, I know there's four bedrooms inside,

and the guide price was £375,000 plus.

Yes, please.

It's gorgeous on the outside,

it's so much better than I was expecting on the inside.

Now, with these Victorian houses,

you usually get very narrow entrance halls, but look.

Look how wide this one is.

Absolutely fabulous.

You've got a lovely reception room here with high ceilings,

with cornicing, marble fireplace there,

you've got this beautiful curve on the wall here.

Cornicing, coving, lovely, lovely stairs.

Wow. The features are endless in this house.

It's just fantastic.

Second reception room.

Now, you can see, you're going to need to take this back

to the bare brick. Everything needs doing.

But if you like your panelled doors and your high ceilings and your

traditional sash windows, this house has got the lot.

I mean, look at this for a fireplace.

That's gorgeous!

Gas fire, well, that's the source of heat in this house.

You're going to really need to think about installing the central heating, obviously.

And a bit of a disappointing kitchen.

You've got to go down a few steps there.

It's rather small, it's dark, you've got a big larder at the back,

so the whole place is going to need a rejig.

It's absolutely fantastic,

and for somebody who would love to take on a house like this, well, it would be ideal.

But let's hope whoever buys this has got a healthy bank balance,

because you really are going to need to spend a lot of money.

# I couldn't love you

# Any better

# I love you just the way you are. #

Let's hope whoever buys this loves it just the way it is and lovingly

restores it back to its former glory instead of ripping out all these

fantastic original features.

So, upstairs, more of what you saw downstairs.

Lovely wide hallways, nice high ceilings.

And you've got one, two, three bedrooms.

Not a bad size. This one is OK,

but this is where it gets really interesting.

OK, so bedroom three.

Bedroom four, follow me.

Here. And through here is the bathroom and toilet.

So you've got to go through this room to get to the bathroom.

Not only that, you've got to go through this room as well,

so two rooms to get to the bathroom.

So you can see you need to think about planning this house.

You need to sit down with a piece of paper and work out what to do.

It might be an extension, it might be knocking some walls down,

but it just doesn't work how it's currently laid out.

If you wanted to stay with the same footprint, could you block up these

connecting doors and create new ones off the hallway somehow?

Hmm, tricky. But outside, you can see that you could possibly

create more space without impinging on the small garden too much.

And you could also think about off-street parking here,

which remedies the issue of that busy road out front.

There is always a but, and the but is, in this case,

it is a conservation area, which could curtail those plans.

To find out how these ideas might be received by the council, we asked a

local estate agent along to fill us in.

In our experience, the planners are very positive about renovations

as long as they are done sensitively and in keeping with the area.

They are not going to want to see ripping windows out

and putting UPVC in, that type of thing, clearly.

But things like the extension, as long as it is done sensitively,

they are going to have a reasonably sympathetic ear to the plight of who

is going to live here. Clearly, the internal layout doesn't really work

for today's modern family, how it is, anyway.

So extending into the infill area is a possibility, but that could mean a

lot of investment, even if you got it for around the £375,000 guide price.

So what could it be worth once renovated?

Assuming the highest-quality finish, I would say as long as the property

is done in that way but not extended,

I would estimate the value to be around 700,000 when it is finished.

If the owner is able to get an extension onto the property,

sorts the problems out upstairs,

perhaps gets some parking into the back as well,

then I think the value then suddenly leaps to late 700,000, perhaps 775,

even as much as 800,000, potentially.

Well, this really is such a lovely big, old, gorgeous Victorian property.

I love it. There are a few layout issues however,

especially with regards to the bathroom access through two bedrooms,

but with a bit of work and re-jigging,

this really could be such a fantastic family home.

Let's see who snapped this one up at auction.

Cracking building, fantastic building.

Rarely available. Over to you, where do you want to start?

500?

500 anywhere?

Well, I've tried to help.

We'll start at 380, then.

380 anywhere?

380. 385.

385.

390.

The bidders were playing it cool to start

but this lot had plenty of interest.

We rejoin the auctioneer looking for 546,000.

546. 547. 548.

547.

With you, sir. 548 elsewhere.

547 sitting down.

It is going, first time.

Second time.

Third and last time.

Well done, 547.

You got there, congratulations.

Seeing off the competition

and buying a character property for £547,000

was charity boss Ramon and his wife Carly,

who works in a local interior design shop.

Both of them have restored period properties before

but this is the first time they have taken one on as developers.

Lucy met up with them to find out more.

Carly and Ramon, congratulations.

What a fantastic house.

-Yes.

-It is absolutely brimming with character features, which I love,

-and a lovely little high street.

-Yes.

-Yes, that's amazing.

-We are very lucky.

-It is a beautiful house.

So who spotted it? Who wanted it?

I think we sort of knew of it for the last 20-odd years, and

then a friend of ours came in to the shop and said,

"Did you know it's got an auction sign?" So we thought, right.

And then we just went up to the auction and I thought this is never going to happen and it did.

So what is it that you like so much about the house?

Well, I think it is the age of it,

it has beautiful brickwork out the front, it is in a great place.

It is also taking something that has been really neglected and sort of

putting in some love

and style back into it and making it a family home for somebody.

We've done several properties before and I think period properties, in

particular, we love all the features and this is unique because it still

has all the old fireplaces, wooden floorboards,

the lovely staircase and everything else with it.

So it is quite a find.

So, Ramon, have you always developed houses in this area?

We had several properties very, very close to here

and for the most peculiar reason,

they have always been corner properties.

I don't know... So this is another corner property, so we are quite

familiar with the area,

-and I suppose passionate about giving it some life back.

-Yeah.

Ramon and Carly have certainly cornered the market on the period property front

and while they have clearly fallen in love with the house,

it still is a business venture and they plan to sell the property once

renovated.

This would be the large...

The first plan of action, really, is to go to the planners,

talk to Highways to get the kerb dropped and hopefully put a drive in at the very bottom.

The rooms upstairs, where, yes, you are not just going through one bedroom,

you're going through two bedrooms to get to the bathroom...

A through through.

Again, subject to the planners allowing us to do it,

we intend to go up at the top of the stairwell on the side and create

another hallway, so you can actually access those off the hallway.

Again, the other potential it has got is to go up into the loft as well

and create another bedroom with a little bathroom in there,

en suite in there.

Ramon will be doing general building work and project managing their

usual team of builders, while Carly,

as you would expect, will be using her interior design knowledge.

With a budget of 120,000 and a timescale of a year,

the couple hope it will be ready to sell but...

Do you have a plan B in case you do not get the permissions you need?

-Oh...

-What if you don't get permission to do the things you want to do here?

Um, as it stands, if you didn't get the permission,

you could still refurbish it and make it

into a lovely family home.

If you look at a couple of the properties adjoining it,

which are very similar, some have extended,

some have just refurbished them and they have sold in the past.

So I mean, simply, if we could put a drive in

and if we just refurbished it,

because Crossrail are coming in,

and if I waited a year, it has gone up anyway.

So we would still make some money out of it.

So it wouldn't be a disaster.

-So you're still very confident?

-Yes.

-Yeah. I think, yeah,

I have a good feeling about it, that it will be good.

Well, guys,

I am so excited to see the outcome and I think this house is going to look beautiful.

Good luck.

Yeah, I hope that all goes really well for you both.

-Thank you.

-Brilliant. Thanks very, very much.

So this is yet another corner house for Carly and Ramon, but it's going

to be a very big project for them.

They've got big plans for this place,

including a two-storey rear extension and a loft conversion.

But will they get the planning permission they need and will they be able

to resist getting carried away and spending too much of their budget?

Find out how the couple get on with this wonderful house

later on in the programme.

Well, earlier we saw how one of our properties had turned out, but what

about the other two?

Yes, all sorts of problems can crop up.

What have our buyers on today's show had to deal with?

Why don't we find out?

Earlier in the show, I was in Netherton in the Black Country,

where I saw a former police office guided at 80 to 90 grand.

The address?

999 Letsby Avenue.

Not really.

Yes, it was the end of the line for the police office and the beginning of the puns.

The two floors were in a CRIMINALLY bad state, and my INVESTIGATION

suggested it was an INSIDE JOB,

apart from outside, which was about introducing LAW AND ORDER.

Keen on developing this into a family home,

but less keen on my police puns, was chemical engineer Angela.

The LONG ARM of the LAW reached all the way to her home in Woking

and she NICKED the property at auction for £86,000.

-How are you going to manage it, if you are down there and this is up north?

-Um, come up and stay

a couple of nights at a time, you know, get the inflatable bed out.

As comfy as a night in the cells for Angela.

Of more comfort was her realistic 15 grand budget

and the three- to four-month timescale. We're back a year later.

Has Angela followed her CONVICTIONS and made this into a house?

# Cops are on the outside Landlord's on the phone

# Quick turn out all the lights Pretend there ain't nobody home

# It's a house arrest Everybody run

# I gotta plead guilty Having too much fun... #

Well, this really is now a brilliant family home.

Angela has knocked through the upstairs toilets to create a family

bathroom. The three bedrooms have been completely redecorated and

downstairs she has added a shower room to the extension area.

This means it could be a fourth bedroom,

and ideal for mobility access.

She has kept most of the kitchen but jazzed it up

with some new glossy units.

And the real clever bit is how she has used law to convert this former

-office.

-The house was originally built as a residential house for the

police. It was used as an office.

So we had to get a change of use to residential.

Turned out that it came under permitted developments, so the council agreed

that we could just change over without having to get any planning permission.

Getting a change of use may have happened speedily but some things

didn't. It has been four months' worth of work for Angela,

as she estimated, but it has been stretched over a year

as she has had to be at home in Woking due to her job.

But she has done a lot of the work herself.

So my main job, as an engineer, I do design work,

did lots of drawings and plans for this and it's just really nice to

see it all finished and all the plans come to fruition.

I did quite a bit of the work initially,

I did a lot of the tiling because I like tiling.

Fitted a lot of the kitchen as well, then we really started to run out of

time, so I got a carpenter in to finish off some bits and the doors,

and a decorator to come in and do the rest.

I grew up doing quite a lot of DIY with my dad, he's very handy.

We did a lot of projects together when I was growing up,

and so I learned quite a few skills and thankfully at the end, when we

needed to finish off, he came down and helped finish it off and blasted

through the rest of the work.

And with that race to finish, her budget doubled from 15 to 30 grand.

I initially thought we could keep the existing air-heating system

but it was very old and the boiler for it was really old so we decided to just replace it.

We had to plaster a few more of the rooms than we were

expecting, so that was increased.

A bit more electrics was increased and then of course I had a lot more

labour costs because I was not here to do more of the work myself.

So, all in all, I am happy enough with the budget.

Those labour costs included getting trades in,

like replacing that heating system,

taking out the old fire alarm and sprinkler system,

replacing the windows and doors, re-plastering and some decorating.

Was it all worth it?

I really like it. I have had ideas of moving in but it is too far away

from work. So it will still be sold now.

But will Angela be happy with the values?

Can she make a profit even with that overspend?

We called in two property experts to give us their valuations and their

thoughts.

I think the owner of this has done a first-class job on it.

It's clean, it's tidy, it's got neutral colours,

it's got a very spacious upstairs bathroom, which is quite nice

and the addition of the en suite downstairs, I think, makes it a good family home.

There's quite a few selling points with this property,

the first being that it offers three good-sized bedrooms,

it's completely refurbished,

nobody has to do any work to it, which buyers are going to like,

they can just move straight in, and having that extra room downstairs

and the en suite downstairs gives it real flexibility, maybe for a larger

family, somebody with an elderly member that is living with them,

or even the potential to use it as a separate living accommodation.

Angela has spent £116,000 buying and converting the police office.

What could she expect in terms of sales and rental?

The rental figure for me on the market would be £695 per calendar month.

If I was to put this property on the open market, I would expect it to

achieve in the region of £150,000.

I'd expect this property to achieve somewhere in the region of £700

to £750 per calendar month. And on the resale market,

I'd expect it to achieve somewhere between £140,000 and £145,000.

Really pleased with the valuations.

For my first project, I think it is a good profit margin,

especially as it has been a part-time job for me, really,

rather than full time so, yeah, I am pleased.

At those top figures, Angela could achieve a £34,000 pre-tax profit

or a rental yield of just over 7.5%.

It took a while and a lot of hard work to convert this police office,

so surely Angela won't be RESISTING A REST now she's finished,

and that is it for the police puns. Promise.

It has been fun but I am really looking forward to a few months off before I start my next project.

So now that I've got my weekends back, I'll be riding my horses a lot more.

And a couple of weddings to go to

and enjoying the weekends again for a while.

Earlier in the programme,

Lucy was in the pretty market town of Berkhamsted in Hertfordshire,

and the property she saw was just as charming as the town itself.

Guided at £375,000 plus,

this four-bed Victorian terrace had more than a few of Lucy's

favourite things.

You've got this beautiful curve on the wall here.

Cornicing, coving, lovely, lovely stairs.

-Wow.

-And although the two reception rooms were the sound of music to

Lucy's ears, well, the tatty kitchen needed to be brought back to life.

But that was nothing compared to the bamboozling layout upstairs.

So bedroom three. Bedroom four, follow me.

Here, and through here...

..is the bathroom and the toilet.

Fortunately, the garden offered a few solutions,

which new owners Ramon and Carly,

who bought the property for £547,000, were well aware of.

The first plan of action, really, is to go to the planners,

talk to Highways to get the kerb dropped

and hopefully put a drive in at the very bottom.

The rooms upstairs, where, yes,

you are not just going through one bedroom,

you're going through two bedrooms to get to the bathroom...

A through through.

Again, subject to the planners allowing us to do it,

we intend to go up at the top of the stairwell on the side and create

another hallway so you can actually access those off the hallway.

The £120,000 budget sounded healthy enough, but in a conservation area

you can never guess what you might have to contend with.

This experienced pair plan to restore this pretty period property in a year.

Well, we're back over two-and-a-half years later.

# Almost there

# We're almost there

# How wonderful

# Wonderful our love will be

# For you, for me... #

Ramon and Carly are not quite there yet

but there have been some pretty major changes.

The ground-floor extension houses the new kitchen,

while the modern first-floor addition

houses the landing for access to what is now a bedroom.

The through through room is now an en suite for the master bedroom,

whilst they have lost the small bedroom at the front

in favour of a master bathroom.

But what they've lost in the first floor,

they've gained in the way of a fabulous new loft extension

with its own bathroom.

Everything is beginning to take shape but thanks to planning and that conservation status,

it has been a long haul from a pre-planning meeting,

submitting plans and resubmitting plans.

Planning was a slight challenge.

So it was five attempts later of redrawing the plans from traditional

build to modern, half modern,

half traditional, but after the said five attempts we finally got there.

All that to-ing and fro-ing with planning cost them a year-and-a-half

but fortunately in the end Ramon and Carly were able to get everything on

their wish list in one form or another, including getting planning

permission for off-street parking.

Mind you, they've not exactly been hanging around in the meantime.

Ramon, Carly and their dream team of builders have completed two other

properties since we last saw them,

not to mention carefully restoring the period features in this house.

We've obviously tried to leave all the fireplaces in.

And the railings outside are actually on order at the moment,

they will be rebuilt as they were.

The only other real feature, there was a beautiful old cupboard upstairs, built-in cupboard.

We've taken, if you like, the front of that and that'll be

rebuilt in the outer hallway

and become a coat cupboard and storage cupboard.

But other than that, obviously, everything else that is in here,

if you want, the coving and so on,

everything has been restored to how it used to be.

This property was always going to be a labour of love for the pair but

such attention to detail and massive delays do not come cheap.

So where do they stand on the £120,000 budget?

So far, we've spent about 120,000 and we will have another 30 to 50,

approximately, to spend still.

Carly and Ramon bought the house for £547,000.

Assuming Ramon's top prediction on renovation costs of 170,000

takes their total spend to 717,000.

So could there be any profit to be made?

We asked two local estate agents what they thought of the renovation,

starting with the agent who saw it first.

I love what they've done to it so far.

It is early days, so the finish is yet to really be determined.

Some of the kitchen, things like that,

haven't obviously been finished yet.

But certainly what I am seeing,

they have got it absolutely on the money.

Very impressed with the size and how bright the property is.

It's quite a balanced property,

considering you've done a loft conversion,

there is a really good flow to the property.

It's lovely.

Whilst it's tricky to value an unfinished property,

both agents agreed on around £900,000.

However, Carly and Ramon don't plan to realise the potential pre-tax

profit of 183,000, they've decided to hold on to it for now.

So what can it rent for?

The demand for properties like this in Berkhamsted on the rental market

is very good.

I would suggest that the achievable rental value is somewhere

between £2,500 and £2,800 per calendar month.

This property would be closer to somewhere between £2,500 and

£3,000 per calendar month.

Probably a little bit on the low side.

We have quite a small cottage not far from here

and that's a three-bedroom,

quite a small cottage, and that is renting for 1,650.

So this is a much more substantial house.

Also know of another property which is very similar to that

and that is well in excess of that. So, again,

I know it's difficult because it's still a building site but when it's

finished, I think they'll probably come back with a slightly different opinion.

Ramon has a lot of knowledge about the area so he's not convinced about

that top estimated yield of 5%.

And there's still a lot to do to get this ready for rental.

I bet he can't wait for that stage.

Yes, very much so.

I think when you live in dust and dirt every day,

and it's getting closer,

sometimes it feels like you're not moving forward but

it is getting closer so I do look forward to it.

There's always a lovely moment when you go in and it's transformed and

sort of morphed into something beautiful.

Yeah, I can't wait.

When it comes to property developing, no matter how experienced you are,

there's always something new you can learn.

Yes, and we'll have plenty more stories for you next time

so make sure you join us here on Homes Under The Hammer.

-Bye.

-Goodbye.