Benvaren is a superb family residence dating back to 1911. With delightful gardens, the villa has superb views set amid spectacular scenery. The accommodation includes 4 bedrooms, 3 reception rooms, kitchen, utility rooms, 2 bathrooms and 2 shower rooms. The beautiful wood panelling in the Reception Hall, together with feature fireplaces, cornicing and picture rails all show a style typical of Edwardian Houses.

A former laundry and toilet, together with former maid’s room have Planning Consent to convert to a one bedroom annex.

The mature and well kept gardens, which are a particular feature of the property, provide a wonderful backdrop slopping gently down towards the shore of the loch.

The village of Lochranza is truly stunning, lying snuggled in a sheltered valley along the edge of the loch, against an imposing backdrop of the surrounding hills. The nearby 17th century ruins of Lochranza Castle were once a royal hunting lodge and an earlier castle on the same site is believed to be where Robert Bruce stayed on his arrival from Ireland in 1306.

Often referred to as ‘Scotland in Miniature’, the Isle of Arran has the best of all the many characteristics of Scotland. From a rugged and mountainous interior in the north, green rolling hills and woodland in the south, the beautiful coastline with pretty villages and sandy bays benefits from the warm climate of The Gulf Stream. A ferry service from Lochranza provides a Summer link to the Kintyre peninsula, known as Arran’s “back door”, whilst a further regular service to the mainland operates from nearby Brodick.

Benvaren is probably one of the “hidden gems” of Lochranza and it is rare for such a property to come on the market.

Offers Over GBP485,000 are being sought for Benvaren. For further information please contact the selling agents.

CKD Galbraith
7 Killoch Place
Ayr KA7 2EA
Ayrshire, Scotland

Contact: R A Cherry BSc MRICS
Tel: 01292 268181
Fax: 01292 292300
E-mail: bob.cherry@ckdgalbraith.co.uk
Web: http://www.ckdgalbraith.co.uk/

CKD Galbraith is one of Scotland’s leading independent property consultancies, with expertise across a broad spectrum of property-related services.

CKD Galbraith operates from 12 offices across Scotland, bringing the firm’s clients a wealth of experience in:

* Residential property sales and lets
* Commercial property sales and management
* Estate, farm and forestry sales and purchases
* Estates, farming and land management
* Building surveying
* Forestry
* Sporting holidays
* Holiday homes

If a new build developer or selling agent offers you a discount from so called "normal price" simply ask yourself why the skilled new build developer or agent needs to do this to sell the property.

Editor

*****************

All 49 flats in this block in Manchester are owned by amateur investors – 37 of them thanks to one property club. Now it is feared that their value has slumped by HALF – or worse – in four years.

Richard Dyson, Financial Mail -16 March 2008

Liability: Bridgewater view in Monton, Manchester

The get-rich-quick advertising of property investment club Inside Track has persuaded more than 100,000 people to attend seminars in the past few years.

But profits at the privately owned club, which are generated mainly by recommending newly built properties to fee-paying members, are sliding.

And the number of people prepared to sign up for its £2,500-a-time seminars has plunged. 

The firm, Britain’s biggest property club, last week axed 44 staff and announced it would cease offering free taster seminars held at hotels and conference centres. But it is not just Inside Track that is suffering – so are some of its clients.

Falling property values, a shortage of tenants and an oversupply of certain types of homes mean some landlords are losing money fast. Lenders are even turning away some landlords (see below), or forcing them to pay punishing rates of interest.

Inside Track boss Tony McKay admits the market is difficult. ‘There is less demand for seminars,’ he says. ‘We are focusing on existing members who are still buying properties but at a slower rate.’ There are 10,000 members, most of whom have bought membership for a fee of several thousand pounds paid on top of the £2,500 seminar bill and McKay says most are happy. Not all, however. 

Photographer Gary Hynes, 51, and dozens of others are sitting on mounting losses through investing in a block of flats called Bridgewater View in Monton, Manchester.

Before the block was built in 2004, Inside Track urged investors to buy two-bedroom flats it said were worth £140,000 and likely to attract up to £650 a month in rent. It is not known what the properties are worth today, but a two-bedroom flat in the development failed to sell at auction in December for a guide price of £70,000. The flat is now let for £425 a month.

Gary, from Oxton, The Wirral, and other Inside Track members are failing to cover their mortgages with rental income. They are having to dip into their savings to meet their mortgage bills and at least one is thought to have had his property repossessed. 

The development of 49 flats, all bought by amateur landlords, and in 37 cases on the recommendation of Inside Track, has been beset by problems. The location, build quality and security have been cited as just a few of many troubles. Inside Track denies responsibility.

Property analysis

This is Money’s expert analysis
 

On top of membership fees to join Inside Track, and the seminars they paid for, investors in this block also paid a ‘finder’s fee’ to the property club in return for the recommendation. Gary estimates he has paid Inside Track more than £9,000 in fees, including a finder’s fee of £4,540.

Big losses: Gary Hynes could be £50,000 worse off because of his property investment.

His total losses, including the estimated fall in the value of the flat, exceed £50,000, he says, and losses are mounting at £200 a month. ‘What we were offered was an armchair service where we were to trust the advice given to us by Inside Track,’ he says. 

‘It promised to do due diligence, check out these properties and recommend the best.’

More than 20 investors in the block have complained to the company. It has since paid for a security firm to make random visits to the site but denied any failure on its part.

McKay says that Inside Track relied on other experts for the recommendation and adds that just one out of ten developments meets its requirements as being suitable for investors. ‘We’re communicating with investors and we’ve helped where we can,’ he says. ‘When things go wrong, we do our utmost to put matters right.’

Inside Track will soon publish its accounts for 2007 and these are expected to show a sharp fall in profits and numbers of people at free seminars. In 2006, the number of attendees fell to 25,000 from 32,000 the year before. The number paying the £2,500 fee dropped to 3,400 from 4,400.

Squeezed lenders cut risky loans  

Inside Track’s promises are tempting: ‘How to retire completely debt-free in three to five years’ and ‘how to buy lucrative UK property with little or no deposit’. 

Whether such goals are realistic is questionable, but life has got harder for all property investors, especially those in newly built, inner-city flats. That is because of the change in mortgage lenders’ attitudes to risk.

Lee Grandin of specialist broker Landlord Mortgages says: ‘New-build is an area where experienced landlords do not invest. In a rising market, novices can make money buying anything, but that doesn’t work in a stagnant market.

‘Lenders have been stung and are taking action to protect themselves by refusing to lend or demanding bigger deposits. People who have bought in the past couple of years have been hit hard and, yes, they could struggle to remortgage.’
 

Nationwide Building Society will not lend money to landlords of new properties, while Coventry wants a 50% deposit on such properties. Other lenders to tighten terms on new flats include Kensington, GMAC, Woolwich and Abbey.

Lenders also worry about mortgage fraud. This has mostly involved newly built properties that have been overvalued.

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