John D Wood & Co.

Recent Comment

Through our dedicated Press Office based in Kensington we are in daily contact with national newspapers and magazines with the aim of achieving editorial coverage for our clients and their properties. This is effectively free exposure which reinforces our extensive marketing and often attracts wider interest for individual properties. Our press office is well respected by the property journalists to whom we offer an efficient service providing quotes, photographs and related information. Whilst editorial coverage is never guaranteed we achieve excellent results with our media reach often being over 10 million readers per week.

The Sunday Telegraph
View full article here: Houses with storybook connections
Ah! A rabbit. Toad Hall, Mrs Tiggy-Winkle’s hillside, Pooh’s Hundred Acre Wood? We know them as if we had lived there. For most of us, such places stay locked in the imagination. But some lucky home owners actually do live in the houses that bore silent witness to their creation, or in the places that inspired them, and some of them are now escaping from the storybooks onto the market.
Look at Bedwell Lodge, for example. It is a Grade II listed 17th-century pile with eight bedrooms, a coach house containing a studio, plus a pool, hard tennis court, folly, woodland and paddock.
 It is close to Essendon in Hertfordshire and priced at £2.5 million by estate agents John D Wood & Co. (020 7908 1108). To most buyers it is a trophy house within commuting distance of London. But how many people know that this is where Mr McGregor’s potting shed was first sketched by Beatrix Potter? The barn in the grounds is where, had he not jumped inside a watering can to hide, Peter Rabbit could have lost his life.
May 2010

The Times
View full article here: Bankers' return sends house prices soaring
Homes in one London suburb are changing hands at record prices as bankers leave the property sidelines and invest their bonuses in family houses. Prices in Fulham in February were up 45 per cent over a year, performing more strongly than neighbouring Chelsea, which is traditionally considered smarter, according to the John D Wood & Co. house index.
Despite Fulham houses in sought- after locations selling for more than at the market’s peak in 2007, the SW6 bounce is not yet inspiring some owners of big-money homes to cash in their gains. The extraordinary price growth of some £1 million-plus residences in the capital and the country is partly a result of a lack of supply. Some owners have delayed putting houses on the market, betting that a Conservative election victory will lead to abolition of home information packs (Hips).
April 2010

The Sunday Telegraph
View full article here: London’s wealthy suburbs – the rich landscape
In boom times, estate agents have reported up to 50 per cent of their buyers coming from London. “The quality of life is what they want,” says Simon Wills at John D Wood & Co. “People move out from the East End of London to Ilford and Romford, then they cross the M25 and move up the A12 corridor. They will always pay a premium and have more disposable income than local buyers.”
The schools in Chelmsford and Colchester promise amazing results to children bright enough to get into them, and pretty villages still offer value for money compared with Hampshire or Berkshire. The run into the City by train or by road is less than an hour.
March 2010

The Daily Telegraph
View full article here: Estate agents bite back
There are plenty of ways to annoy an estate agent. Just mention HIPs, or ask them to raise the price of your house when it's already on the market. But nothing gets up an estate agent's nose as much as Sarah Beeny's new website, tepilo.com. I know this because of the barrage of angry emails and phone calls I received after interviewing Beeny about it a couple of weeks ago.
"It was a red rag to a bull," said Peter Young, of John D Wood & Co. - and I suppose it was, given Beeny said using an estate agent was "money for old rope". No, tepilo.com "just won't catch", says Young. "Valuation is an art as well as a science and we can play purchasers off against each other. Not to mention the security issues of allowing people to wander around your house. You can buy a camera or a car on the net for the best price, but not property. Every house is different." A good estate agent, he says, lets a property sell itself by quietly pointing out the salient things. They enjoy the cut and thrust of negotiating and can see the wood for the trees. Nevertheless, plenty of vendors are keen to give tepilo.com a chance. You might even get Peter Young knocking on your door. He told me that he would like to use it to snap up cheap property for his children.
February 2010

The Times
View full article here: Life behind a wall of glass
As a nation we Brits like our privacy and generally prefer to play out our home lives with blinds closed and curtains tightly drawn. Not Henry Squire, pictured, who lives in a house in which the entire façade is clad in huge sheets of glass.
This floods his rooms with light — but also gives anyone walking through Paradise Park in Holloway, North London, an eyeful of his supersleek kitchen and taste in soft furnishings (white).
Contemporary architects have embraced expanses of glass because of the way it maximises natural illumination. Agents say that enthusiasm for this kind of design is growing and prices regularly exceed comparable properties with regular windows.
Squire, 37, is a director of Squire and Partners, the architectural practice working on the controversial Chelsea Barracks redevelopment. Having helped to design the Holloway glass home, he put his money where his mouth was and moved in some six years ago. He is now leaving his glass house to be near friends and family in south-west London. He has put his home on the market with John D Wood & Co. for £950,000.
February 2010

The Evening Standard
View full article here: ‘Bonus belt’ central London house prices jump 51% to conquer peak of 2007
  An analysis of sales of 4,000 houses and 5,500 flats across the “bonus belt” favoured by City and international buyers shows how values have recovered dramatically in the past year.
By December many houses were selling for record prices, having shot up by 51 per cent from their lowest point in February last year, the survey by agents John D Wood & Co. has found.
However, the phenomenon is not limited to the “prime” central London market but has also been seen in areas such as Hammersmith and Battersea. Peter Young, managing director of John D Wood & Co, said: “Following one of the worst financial crises in recent memory the central London house market has rebounded strongly and surpassed the previous high.
“The weakness of sterling has meant we have had an influx of foreigners which has galvanised the domestic market and forced buyers to compete over the limited number of houses available.”
In Chelsea the best flats are now achieving prices equal to, or in excess of, levels at the peak of the market.” He said that in December he sold a house in need of modernisation in Radnor Walk for £2.2 million, equivalent to £1,489 per sq ft. A similar house had sold in April 2008 for £1.9 million or £1,169 per sq ft.
January 2010

Press Coverage