Agricultural self-build with a twist

The challenge

This person had purchased a plot of land and wanted to build their perfect home on it. However, the land featured an old, metal cowshed which had a preservation order on it, which meant it couldn’t be demolished to make way for a newbuild. So, the customer came up with a cunning plan to incorporate the shed in their property design – they would build their new home around it, and make an architectural feature of it! Many lenders would have judged a project like this too quirky and therefore too risky, partly due to the build challenges and question marks the unusual design raised over the finished property’s future value.

We did

We got stuck in to finding a solution and agreed to lend on the property, subject to some additional explanations and assurances from the project’s architect, builder and property surveyor, that the property would be sufficiently structurally sound and have a reasonable resale value whenever the applicant chose to sell it on. Once these were provided, we could see absolutely no reason not to provide a mortgage for what was clearly going to be a unique, creative and – in the end – stunning property. However, it took time and effort to get under the skin of the problem – something many other lenders just aren’t able to give.

The result

An architecturally stunning dream home for the buyer, which also rejuvenated and preserved a historic rural building.