The 10 most unusual homes ever listed for sale on Rightmove

It’s arduous to think about the time earlier than Rightmove, so profound has its impact been on the seek for a brand new dwelling. Launched in 2000, the property portal has given us entry to fantasy homes, wacky interiors and downright loopy properties for the final 25 years.

“Billions of minutes are spent on Rightmove annually, and these properties present simply how splendidly numerous the housing market could be,” says Colleen Babcock, Rightmove’s property professional.

“From the wildly imaginative to the superbly weird, these listings have captured hearts, headlines, and hashtags. They remind us {that a} dwelling isn’t simply bricks and mortar, it’s a mirrored image of persona, creativity, and typically, pure eccentricity.

“Whether or not it’s a stiletto-shaped bathtub or a shark diving by way of a roof, these properties show that the UK housing market is filled with surprises, and we love celebrating the moments that make folks cease, smile, and share.”

From an all-purple home to a glitzy personal island, listed below are a few of Rightmove’s most talked about listings over the previous 25 years.

You don’t need to be a Rightmove addict to have seen photos of The Shark Home, a Victorian terrace with a 25-foot fibreglass and metal shark sculpture crashing headfirst into its roof.

The controversial sculpture was conceived in 1986 by Invoice Heine, the present proprietor’s father, and the sculptor John Buckley. After a lot debate, Heine managed to persuade Oxford metropolis council that the shark ought to stay.

“The shark was to specific somebody feeling completely impotent and ripping a gap of their roof out of a way of impotence and anger and desperation…. It’s saying one thing about CND, nuclear energy, Chernobyl and Nagasaki,” mentioned Heine on the time.

Now, the four-bedroom home has turn out to be an area landmark, receiving listed standing in 2022, to the proprietor’s dismay. It was listed for hire earlier this yr, and stays accessible to let by way of Chancellors for £4,000 per thirty days.

Constructed within the mid-Nineteenth century to guard in opposition to Napoleonic invasion, this personal island —full with its Grade II-listed coastal fort— has been a lodge and household dwelling for the reason that Nineteen Thirties.

The two.5-acre Thorne Island is just accessible by boat, and was listed for £550,000 in 2016, needing, as Knight Frank put it on the time, “a good bit of funding”.

Its present homeowners have accomplished an in depth restoration of the historic fort, turning it into a novel, 8,000 sq. foot dwelling. There’s a rooftop bar and video games room, courtyard, 5 personal sea moorings, house for 20 visitors, 360-degree views – and the property is totally off-grid.

Now, the island is again in the marketplace. It was listed for £3 million in August with Strutt & Parker.

In January, the web went mad for an iconic bathtub in Wales. Sure, the purple one formed like a large stiletto, standing in the course of the neutral-toned lavatory.

That it discovered itself in a Grade II-listed, sixteenth century property with in any other case extra conventional interiors —uncovered timbers, wooden panelling and heavy picket vintage furnishings— made it even higher.

The property, described as a “extremely particular person dwelling with a particular splash of glamour” remains to be on the market with Dafydd Hardy for £875,000.

Final yr, a home in Rawdon hit the marketplace for £1.7 million: it had 5 bedrooms, 1.8 acres of land, a fitness center, landscaped gardens – oh, and a Star Wars-inspired cinema and video games room which took the homeowners two years to finish.

The room, with a pool desk, drinks space, projector display and reclining cinema seats, was produced as a full reproduction of Star Wars’ Millennium Falcon flight deck. The white partitions are bulkhead-like, with replica spaceship doorways and studded panels that mimic the evening sky.

Constructed within the house between two homes, this slender property measures simply seven toes (2.1 metres) throughout. Two bedrooms —which might nearly match double beds— two bogs and a roof terrace have been miraculously packed into this compact dwelling, which covers 538 sq. toes of house over three storeys.

“It’s a must to remind your self that you simply’re in a home that’s narrower than a London Tube,” says Simon Stone, the company’s managing companion.

In 2013, a former barn in Dunsford, outdoors Exeter, drew curiosity. Not for its views over the river Teign or its tasteful, cottage-style conversion, however for its reproduction of Dr Who’s well-known blue Tardis which stood within the hallway subsequent to the steps.

It was listed for £425,000 with Stags property company, which, funnier nonetheless, selected to not reference the Tardis of their property description.

This pebbledashed, semi-detached home in Hillingdon got here with a shock when it was marketed for £400,000 in 2013: its interiors, with out exception, have been purple. We’re speaking plush purple carpets and lilac partitions; lavender bedspreads and violet cabinetry.

The home was described as a “cleverly deliberate and prolonged four-bedroom semi-detached dwelling” by the itemizing brokers, who as soon as once more determined to not point out its vibrant décor.

At its narrowest level, the one-bedroom, 339-square-foot property measures simply three toes (91cm) broad. However over its two awkwardly-shaped storeys, the homeowners had managed to suit a kitchen, eating desk, lavatory, tiny lounge and bed room, with a double mattress pressed in opposition to the wall.

The home was put up on the market in 2017 and ultimately bought for £190,000 in 2021 by its earlier homeowners, who used it as a vacation let. It offered once more in July for £225,000.

Essex’s Osea Island is the stuff of fantasy: a complete personal island, full with 38 homes, recording studio, golf course, mild plane and helicopter touchdown areas and its personal pub.

Unsurprisingly, it’s a widespread superstar hang-out, with the likes of Rihanna, Stormzy and Charlie XCX recording within the studio, and Olly Murs selecting Osea Island for his marriage ceremony in 2023.

As soon as a Victorian Turkish bathhouse, this Grade II-listed property was reworked by its homeowners into an eccentric, carnival-themed dwelling. Suppose classic carnival indicators, a tenpin bowling alley, fairground video games and loads of wacky décor.

The property was listed for £1.5 million in 2019 and has appeared in the marketplace a number of occasions since. It doesn’t seem to have offered, in response to the Land Registry, and is at present run as an occasions house and Airbnb let. It sleeps 14, together with use of the triple-stack bunkbeds.