[T]he increasingly global appeal of the Lake District as an attractive location for investors has been proven by the sale of a country guest house to a business based in India by real estate advisors Colliers International.
The specialist hotels team at Colliers sold Grizedale Lodge in Grizedale Forest near Hawkshead, Ambleside from an asking price of £1.1m to Paramount United Ltd, a business owned by Gokul and Rashida Jaykrishna from Ahmedabad.
Colliers understands that the investment represents the first acquisition in the Lake District and the wider North West of England by Mr and Mrs Jaykrishna, who own similar properties in continental Europe and North America.
Located between the visitor hotspots of Lake Windermere and Coniston Water, Grizedale Lodge is a former hunting lodge with eight individually styled en-suite bedrooms, three-bedroom owners’ accommodation, gardens and car parking.
Haydn Spedding, associate director, hotels agency at the Manchester office of Colliers, achieved the sale on behalf of retiring owners Richard and Deborah Charley, and said: “We believe this represents our first sale of a Lake District guest house to an Indian investor.
“The acquisition highlights the increasing appeal of the region to international investors following it being awarded World Heritage Status by Unesco and an important place in which to invest outside of London and the South East of England.”
Haydn said Mr and Mrs Jaykrishna had not confirmed their plans for Grizedale Lodge but understood that its appeal and that of the Lake District was based partly on the type of place “where they like to spend time themselves”.
Other international deals in the Lake District secured by Colliers include Borrowdale Gates Hotel, one of the region’s foremost country house hotels, being acquired in 2017 by Fairtree Hospitality Real Estate Private Equity Fund, the Guernsey investment vehicle managed by international asset management company Fairtree Capital.
The Lake District is Colliers’ most productive region for hospitality sector deals in the UK, with the agency securing more than 30 sales there in the past two years.
Colliers believes that the main drivers of such sales in 2017 – the weak pound, low interest rates and poorly performing savings accounts, ISAs and pension schemes – will continue to encourage such deals during 2018.
