Grand designers cash in on creations by renting them out
Families featured on show are able to list their homes on letting sites for treble that of similar properties
and or two decades, professional and aspirational architects have invited television crews to showcase their property projects, sharing the highs and lows of their builds with the audience of Channel 4’s Grand Designs.
Now a number of families whose time consuming and often overbudget builds featured on the show are turning to online holiday letting websites like Airbnb to reclaim their costs and earn some extra money.
Some homes and rooms appear online just weeks after their broadcast
Fwith others advertised at a premium.
For some, an appearance on the notorious property show with more than two million viewers affords them the luxury of listing their homes for three times the price of similar houses in the same area. The Sunday Telegraph has found that at least 10 per cent of homes featured on the programme are cashing in on their creations by specifically marketing them online with the description: “As seen on Grand Designs”.
And it works – the draw for fans of the show is the opportunity to stay in a Victorian water tower in South London, the annexe of a cob house and sleek homes in areas of outstanding natural beauty, that they have pined for themselves.
Monty Ravenscroft’s eco-friendly home with a sliding glass roof proved a hit on the show in 2005, and shortly after, he learned the power of the programme. The actor and design engineer, along with his wife Claire, threw open the doors to their South London home to allow lovers of modern architecture to explore every nook and cranny of the property.
“We had 100 people come into the house every hour. Some were waiting up to 45 minutes to be come in,” Mr Ravenscroft, 51, said.
“I’ve done the open house event now for 15 years, and we generally get about 800 people on a single day. The programme gave it great publicity.”
The couple, who still live there, began converting a small strip of urban land into their dream home in 2003, eventually spending £170,000 on the build, which was completed a few years later.
The house has proven popular with cash-strapped Londoners eager to maximise space. Now, the three- bedroom property, which even has three bathrooms (one next to a bed) and numerous buttons and gadgets, is rented out for £255-a-night.
For Alex and Cheryl Reay, it all changed when the thatched roof of their 17th-century cottage in the New Forest was on fire, leaving them homeless. They have managed to transform the impact of that smouldering thatch fire in 2004 into a profitable second income-stream after their renovation created a Hampshire holiday rental.
The £300,000 rebuild featured in a Grand Designs episode in 2007, and the couple, along with their daughter Biba “Phoenix” Reay born three days after the fire and who all live at the property, rent the annex out for between £1,295 and £1,495 a week.
“I would say the majority of people who come to stay have seen the story on the programme,” Mrs Reay, 50, said. “But, we made that £300,000 investment back over three years renting the annex out for families.
“We used to have a DVD of the show, but because we gave it to the guests who hadn’t seen it, it ended up getting a bit scratched.”
Although, Mrs Reay believes her prices are competitive and based on the property’s true commercial value, she admits “Grand Designs gives it an attraction and perhaps a slight increase in rental charge.”
The couple promote the rental on their own website, which features video clips from the programme.
The Ravenscroft and Reay families may have originally set out to keep their homes to themselves, but Angelo Mastropietro, 41, discovered an 800-year-old cave in Worcestershire and decided to give holidaymakers a taste of their primitive past, turning it into a business immediately after appearing on Grand Designs in 2015.
“The Rockhouse is a very special place and I wanted others to have the opportunity to experience it,” he said.
Mr Mastropietro added appearing on the show has helped publicity and that two people have even offered to buy the property.
He said: “People often get in touch to congratulate my achievement … some guests have seen it on Grand Designs, see it advertised and book the experience.
“Others are simply drawn to its unique magical charm and character and watch the episode afterwards.”
‘The Rockhouse is a very special place and I wanted others to have the opportunity to experience it’