Thursday, 20 August 2020

FOR SALE Highfields Farm, Thorpe Constantine

Highfields Farm is delightfully traditional farmhouse, full of character and history, situated approximately 2 miles south of the village of Clifton Campville in south Staffordshire and about 5 miles north of Tamworth. A perfect lifestyle property for those interested in cottage industry, looking to create a business from home such as for Air BnB or holiday lets, a rural office complex, or alternatively, those re-addressing priorities and looking for a rural retreat for a working-from-home base out of the capital or other major business centres. Above all else, Highfields Farm is a fantastic home with plenty of space to grow for a family who love the countryside.

Formerly part of the Thorpe Constantine Estate, the farm has been in the current owners’ occupation for 30 years, firstly as tenants of the Thorpe Estate and more recently as freehold owners. The farm has been home to a substantial herd of milking goats and the owners have produced high quality artisan goats’ cheese under the ‘Innes Cheese’ brand, marketed and sold through retailers such as Neal’s Yard Dairy in London.

The farm is well positioned for Midlands centres, being approximately 5 miles from J11 of the M42 and 8 miles from J10, which intersects with the A5 trunk road for ease of travel east and west. The A38 is approximately 8 miles to the west and the cathedral city of Lichfield is approximately 12 miles. Tamworth has mainline rail services to both London Euston (from 70 minutes) and Birmingham New Street (20 minutes) The nearest airports are Birmingham International (20 miles) and East Midlands (22 miles).

Highfields Farm Farmhouse

The farmhouse is Grade II Listed and dates from the early 1800’s, being built of brick under a slate roof. The accommodation is fabulously chic but offers enormous scope for adding further value. The farmhouse layout gives well-proportioned rooms with double glazed sash windows to the ground floor. The kitchen is large and spacious with a range of kitchen units, double Belfast sink, space for a range oven or Aga and access to a substantial cellar. A true entertaining space or heart of the home for a growing family.

As well as a large living room, the ground floor also has a spacious dining room, a very cosy snug and a separate WC off the rear hall. The cellar is suitable for storage (including wine, of course) and is split into three chambers, being accessed via two staircases from the kitchen and reception hall.

On the first floor, three double bedrooms, one with an en-suite bathroom, a single bedroom and shower room make up the existing layout. The bathrooms have been thoughtfully fitted out, with a freestanding roll top bath in the en-suite, and bespoke wash basins.

Top Floor Privacy for Older Children

The entire top floor has in the past been laid out as a separate flat with its own kitchen, bathroom, two double bedrooms and a large living area. The present layout offers a superb space for a large family, being an excellent childrens/teenagers play area.

On its southern elevation, the farmhouse benefits from a large garden, predominantly laid to lawn, with a brick paved seating area for outside dining and entertaining, plenty of mature fruit trees and a large vegetable patch. There is also a gateway from the garden through into one of the paddocks.

The Outbuildings

In addition to the farmhouse, the property benefits from two attractive brick and tile, two storey ranges which offer excellent scope for alternative uses. One of these has been used by the current owners to house their successful, award-winning goats cheese production. The ground floor rooms are fitted out to comply with food preparation standards whilst the upper floor offers ample office and storage space. The second two storey range is currently unused but formerly housed the Thorpe Estate bakery.

There is a range of further modern agricultural buildings, including a brick and tile open fronted livestock shed, a three bay Dutch barn, a single bay monopitch building, a sizable five bay (22.70m x 19.00m) steel portal frame livestock shed with fibre cement roof and cladding and raised central feed passage, a steel framed 5 bay lean-to (22.7 0m x 6.17m) housing former dairy and milking parlour, a five bay (22.7 0m x 10.50m) concrete portal framed livestock shed with fibre cement roof and cladding to one side, a five bay (22.7 0m x 11.5 0m) steel portal frame livestock building with a raised feed passage, fibre cement roof and part concrete block walls, an eight bay (36.6 0m x 11.05m) concrete portal frame general purpose building with concrete floor, fibre cement roof and concrete block walls and finally a disused brick and steel framed milking parlour.

The Land

The property extends to approximately 11.96 acres (4.84 ha) or thereabouts and comprises an attractive pasture paddock close to the house of about 1.74 acres (0.70 ha) and a further pasture field of about 7.33 acres (2.97 ha) lying to the north of the buildings. The paddock near the house has separate vehicle access to the drive and access through a timber five bar gate into the garden. There is also a smaller turnout paddock to the left of the drive. The property is on a relatively quiet lane and there are a number of long rural bridleways in close proximity.

The house and buildings are connected to mains water and electricity. Foul drainage is to a private sewage treatment system which comprises two brick settlement tanks and filtration beds to which discharge into the pond in the main field to the north of the buildings. There is no mains gas to the property.

Sustainable Living at Highfields Farm

To aid a sustainable lifestyle and to support environmentally friendly farming, the house and the cheese building are centrally heated by a Twin Heat 80KW wood chip boiler located in the brick and tile range to the rear of the house. The boiler is automatically fed from a steel free standing hopper to the rear of the boiler house. The house and the cheese room both have a separate hot water cylinders fed from the boiler, as does the milking parlour. The woodchip boiler benefits from payments under the Renewable Heat Incentive (RHI) of about £9,000 per annum. There are also payments under the Feed-in-Tariff (FIT) for 14kw of roof mounted solar panels.

As well as being a delightfully traditional small holding, there is excellent potential for the conversion of the buildings to other uses, providing the correct permissions are sought, to include equestrian, residential, holiday let accommodation, rural offices and storage. There is an overage from the original estate on any increase in value which we can discuss with interested parties.

To arrange a viewing of Highfields Farm

For further information and to discuss the opportunity of a virtual tour and viewing of this property, please call 01827 721380 and one of our team will get back to you as soon as possible. We are following strict government guidelines in terms of risk assessment, wearing PPE and social distancing when conducting viewings.