Remains of the day

Buying a property that includes a ruin carries undoubted romance, but there are caveats, reminds Lucy Denton, who advises on the help at hand

- 

To the Georgian artist, the painterly appeal of ruined priories and their broken outlines lay in the effect on the senses, recording decay as picturesque scenes, as places of poetic intrigue. Derelict strongholds and stony contours of some long-lost cloister sketched out in watercolour hinted at bygone status, drawing out a romantic retort. All kinds of architectural fragments survive in the parks of country estates, many former monastic lands granted post-Dissolution to aristocratic families who built new houses nearby. Buying a property complete with an ancient wreck is, to many, an attractive prospect, but it comes with caveats for would-be purchasers.

‘The draw is that it is historically interesting and the house looks out over the ruins and the river,’ points out John Coleman, director at GSC Grays in Richmond, on the spectacular arrangement at the 1,103-acre Kirkham estate on the River Derwent in North Yorkshire (Property market, June 11). It is currently for sale for $25 million with GSC Grays (01748 897630), complete with the early 19th-century, pale gold-coloured mansion at its core and the craggy remnants of the Augustinian Kirkham Priory nearby, hollowed out by commissioners to Henry VIII. Yet, having the old shell of a building as part of an estate requires an understanding of statutory designations and associated obligations.