I
have done some research that I hope you will find of interest, on terraced
houses a particular favourite of mine.
In
architectural terms a terraced or townhouse is a style of housing which was introduced
in the late 1600’s in the UK, where a row of symmetrical/identical houses share
their side walls. The first terraced houses were actually built by Monsieur
Barbon around St. Paul’s Cathedral as part of the rebuilding process after the
Great Fire of London in 1666. Interestingly, it was the French that invented
the terraced house around 1610-15 in the Le Marais district of Paris with its planned squares and
properties with identical facades. However, it was the 1730’s in the UK, that
the terraced/townhouse came into its own in London and of course in Bath with the
impressive Royal Crescent.
However,
we are in Solihull, not Bath, so the majority of our Solihull terraced houses
were built in the Victorian era, built on the back of the Industrial Revolution. With people flooding into the towns and
cities for work in Victorian times, the terraced house offered decent livable
accommodation away from the slums. In actual fact the majority of Victorian Solihull
terraced houses are based on standard design of a ‘posh’ front room, a back
room (where the family lived day to day) and scullery off that. Off the scullery, a door to a rear yard,
whilst upstairs, three bedrooms (the third straight off the second). As an interesting fact the law was changed in
1875 with the Public Health Act and each house had to have 108 ft of livable space
per main room, running water, it’s own outside toilet and rear access to allow
the toilet waste to be collected.
It
was the 1960’s and 70’s when inside toilets and bathrooms were installed, often
in that third bedroom or an extension off the scullery. Since the 1980’s gas central heating and
replacement Upvc double glazing have been installed in every home.
Looking
at the make up of all the properties in Solihull, some very interesting numbers
appear. Of the 52,184 properties in Solihull
…
17,212
are Detached properties (32.9%)
22,234
are Semi Detached properties (42.6%)
4,896
are Terraced / Town House properties (9.3%)
7,833
are Apartment/ Flat’s (15.0%)
And
quite noteworthy, there are 9 mobile homes, representing 0.02% of all property
in Solihull.
Looking
at the values, the average price paid for a Solihull terraced house in 1995 was
£63,240 and the latest set of figures released by the land Registry states that
today that figure stands at £243,980, a rise of 286% - not bad when you
consider apartments in Solihull in the same time frame have only risen by 151%.
But
then a lot of buy to let landlords and first time buyers I speak to think the
Victorian terraced house is expensive to maintain. I recently read a report from English Heritage
that stated maintaining a typical Victorian terraced house over thirty years is
around sixty percent cheaper than building and maintaining a modern house - fascinating don’t you think!
Don’t
dismiss the humble terraced house – especially in Solihull! For more tips and advice on the Solihull property market please email me on jane.morcom@centrickproperty.co.uk
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