Northern estate offers late-season investment opportunity
Roachburn Farm, part of the Greenside Estate, with further estate land also in view © GSC Grays On the Cumbria-Northumberland border, the Greenside Estate is one of the few investment properties to come to the open market in the north this year.
It is a mix of in-hand and mainly let farmland, residential, woodland, investment, development and sporting interests across about 1,844 acres on the edge of the North Pennines Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty.
The estate was originally owned by the Earl of Carlisle and was part of the former Naworth Castle and Castle Howard Estate, which was separated in 1916.
It comes to the market with a guide price of £4.795m as the owning family is repositioning its assets, reinvesting the sale proceeds in different areas.
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There are four farms let on Agricultural Holdings Act 1986 tenancies, with the largest coming vacant in September 2024 when the tenant retires.
The Greenside Estate
- Well-equipped stock farm of about 676 acres, with vacant possession from 2024
- Three quality stock farms let on secure agricultural tenancies, almost 949 acres in total
- 119 acres of productive in-hand farmland
- Four vacant residential properties
- Just over 81 acres of commercial and amenity woodland
- Two telecommunication masts
- Playing fields, gardens and allotments
- Development opportunities
- Good potential for low ground shooting and stalking
- Significant carbon and natural capital potential
- Current annual rental income about £39,251
“The Greenside Estate offers a diverse portfolio of rural property assets for sale, from gardens and allotments to in-hand land and farms,” said John Coleman, head of land and farm sales at GSC Grays, which is joint agent with JM Osborne.
“It’s a substantial and versatile rural estate with significant carbon and natural capital potential and offers multiple income sources including residential properties, telecommunication masts and commercial woodlands.
“It has huge potential for future development, making it an attractive investment opportunity for the right buyer or investor.”
Among the total of 20 lots, there are also smaller blocks of land that have historically been occupied on annual grazing licence agreements and farm business tenancies (FBT) which are now offered with vacant possession.
There are two main commercial forestry blocks and almost 30 smaller blocks of mature mixed-species woodland and great scope for further woodland creation, according to GSC Grays.
The land is mainly Grade 4 and 5 with soils ranging from freely draining, slightly acid sandy soil in the lowland to more peaty, loamy soils in the estate’s upland areas.
Save for the wooded areas, the land is all down to grass, and offers long grazing seasons, while there are some areas of low ground with high yielding arable potential.
There are farm business diversification opportunities and good sporting potential for pheasant, partridge drives and roe deer.
Part of one of the farms is in the North Pennines Special Protection Area and Special Area of Conservation.