How to win in Cornwall’s bonkers property market

Quoting Clare Coode of Stacks Property Finders

Clare Coode, head of the Cornwall branch of property finder Stacks Property Search, recently secured a coastal plot in the west of the county for a client based in Singapore on the strength of video tours and Zoom meetings with architects and planning consultants.

Two of Clare Coode’s clients have won competitive bids this year by appealing to vendors’ Cornish hearts. 

“In one situation where we were buying a house that had been in the same family for 30 years, they wanted to sell to someone who was actually going to live in the house and send their children to Cornish schools rather than a second-home owner,” she said.

Some buyers are also acutely aware of the ethics of pricing out local buyers. Ms Coode added: “I have had one or two particularly sensitive clients who have told me that they don’t want to compete against a local buyer and would rather wait for another property to come along if they are going to push a local out of a village.”

It is not all about coastal Cornwall, however: house prices in the centre of the county have also risen in the pandemic boom, added Ms Coode. “In mid Cornwall, it used to be hard to find a small country house with a bit of land for under £1.25m; now it’s a struggle to find one under £1.75m.”

“Many Cornish homeowners are sitting tight, even though prices are rocketing,” said Ms Coode. “If they sell and achieve top price for their house, they run the risk of not finding anything they want to move to. This is one of the reasons that supply is so limited, and prices are rising.”

Not everyone is looking for a second home, she added. Among clients planning to move to the area full-time are a couple from France who are hoping to make Cornwall their main residence. They too had to buy sight unseen.

 

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