when the east wing designed by Alexander Ross was added. [from an old postcard]
Savills unable to sell estate after previous owner granted agricultural tenancy to one of their own directors
The estate agent Savills has had to scrap plans to sell the Ury Estate near Stonehaven after it emerged that the former owner, FM Developments, had granted an agricultural tenancy and a right to buy to one of their own directors, John Forbes, a farmer in the northeast of Scotland.
The move is an embarrassment for the upmarket estate agency, as the estate had attracted interest from several consortia of developers.
The right-to-buy notice was registered with the Registers of Scotland but Savills only became aware of it on 14 August, despite the fact it was put in place and sanctioned by Bank of Scotland Corporate, FM’s lenders, in 2003. Thwarted bidders for the site said the mere existence of the notice makes the 1,500 acre estate unsellable.
Savills declined to comment but is understood to be furious that this information was not passed on to it before it was instructed to sell Ury by FM’s administrators, Zolfo Cooper (formerly known as Kroll) in March.
FM Developments, ten of whose companies went into administration in February, bought Ury in 2001. The firm, led by Jonathan Milne, whose father John Milne is Forbes’s first cousin, had been intending to build 238 houses on the estate, redevelop the ruined Ury House as a deluxe hotel and build a Jack Nicklaus-designed golf course on the site.
Ury House, the centrepiece of the estate is a large ruined Jacobean mansion built 1855 by Sir Alexander Baird, 1st Baronet, and extended in 1884. It is situated about one mile north of Stonehaven in what was previpusly Kincardineshire.
A spokesman for Zolfo Cooper said the Ury Estate is still for sale. He added that the “right to buy” and “agricultural tenancy” granted to John Forbes & Partner “is not a position that is accepted by the administrators”.
It has been suggested Zolfo Cooper would take legal action against John Forbes. It is also understood that some of the bidders will seek financial redress from Zolfo Cooper to cover professional fees incurred when working up proposals for the site.
John Forbes, 62, farms 5,000 acres in Angus and has three dairy herds, 1,600 outdoor breeding sows, mixed arable crops, flowers, bulbs and vegetables. He established East Coast Viners Grain in 1977 as a feed-milling company supplying grain, fertiliser and feeds to farmers across Scotland.
FM, which stands for Forbes Milne, focused on the development of homes and leisure facilities throughout Scotland and abroad at Cape Verde and St Lucia.
The Bank of Scotland declined to comment.
This article was published in The Sunday Times on 27 Sept 2009