£2.5m for a knockdown which you can’t knockdown

[Propertypornographer]

Feast your eyes on this: £2.5m for a 1920s house in need of modernisation. Not too many period features unlike a grand Victorian home with bay windows and fireplaces and high ceilings. Yes it’s a posh postcode and it backs onto
a park but it’s very near the noisy end of the south circular and a huge estate. The garden looks an odd shape. It’s not in catchment for great state schools and it’s a 15 minute walk - not 5 - to posh shops and far from a train line etc. It says detached but it looks like the garage is right next to the neighbour’s one. It’s in a conservation area so you would struggle to get planning permission to knock it down. You’d have to remodel probably at a cost of at least 500k to make it a four bed house with decent living space.

What am I missing?

www.rightmove.co.uk/properties/152274461#/?channel=RES_BUY

It’s in a conservation area so you would struggle to get planning permission to knock it down.

Looking on Streetview they seem to have done that elsewhere along the road though. The planned houses look to be in keeping with the existing ones in style so that might be how it got through.

There is a presumption against demolition but this Conservation area already has new estates within it. Planning would be required for extending but that’s probably ok. Conservation of the street scape isn’t affected by a rear extension. There’s a lot of possibilities to make it highly desirable.

I half sympathise with your views, OP. I’m sure the house will sell in the region of £2m+ for the bones of it (it’s saying off the market right now but who knows why?) but it’s not really in Dulwich Village proper. It’s more top end of Lordship Lane. I live very close (on the other side of the tracks and postcode) and you won’t hear traffic noise where it is. But it’s not in catchment for the Charter School - agree the buyers are likely to go private but good to tick that box - and it’s a decent walk from there to any station. I like it as a house more than you do though and think it’s got a lot of potential.

This thread made me think of the Thatchers who bought that house in a (then) new development close to the South Circular. Didn't seem very thought through, they didn't stay long.

That was on Frank Dixon Close, where the £10m box is.

The house has been reduced by 225k now…
The Thatchers lived on the other side of the south circular from Frank Dixon Close, backing onto the golf course. Weird development: big detached houses all very close together.

It’s still for sale 5 months on… They haven’t dropped the price below £2.25m.