Stamford Brook Vicarage Remains Unsold Despite Price Cut
Current owner offers to redesign it to buyer's specification
House is on the corner of Stamford Brook Road and Flanchford Road. Picture: Hamptons
Having slashed the offer price of a former Victorian vicarage in Stamford Brook, the owner is now offering a discounted makeover of the property to encourage buyers.
Kam Baebee originally wanted £9,000,000 for the seven bedroom neogothic mansion but by this June was willing to sell for £6,950,000. Despite the efforts of estate agents Hamptons, Knight Frank and Dexters ,the house on the corner of Stamford Brook Road and Flanchford Road remains on the market.
In an interview with The Time newspaper recently he has said that his company, which specialises in luxury refurbishments can redesign the interior of the home if its current look doesn’t suit the new buyer much more cheaply than another company could.
The home was a labour of love for the 55-year-old property developer who claims to have refurbished over 100 properties. He has followed in the footsteps of his father who built and fitted out villas for the Shah of Iran, but the revolution meant his family had their property and business assets seized in 1979. Tehran airport was built on the site of one of their estates. Mr Baebee was sent to England to live with his grandmother in England while his parents remained and built up a travel agency.
Having started out as a car salesman, Mr Baebee eventually moved into the luxury property business and founded K10 group with the Phones 4 U billionaire John Caudwell who he claims as his closest friend. Projects the company has worked on included the renovation of ballerina Margot Fonteyn’s £75 million home in Knightsbridge.
Mr Baebee says all his expertise was used to upgrade his family home with no expense spared. He purchased the property, which was built in 1886 to a design by the architect Charles J Gladman. It originally served as a vicarage attached to the neighbouring St. Mary’s Church, which was converted into luxury apartments in 1984.
The property was upgraded in keeping with the gothic feel intended by its creators including fake ruins in the garden and an original oak staircase that snakes through the property.
The entrance hallway at the former vicarage. Picture: Hamptons
He added a basement which contained a hairdressing salon plus a party space and hot tub and transformed the 40ft-long reception room, with oak parquet flooring, mock-gothic windows and cornicing which was used to promote the BBC2 reality show Crazy Rich Agents: Selling Dream Homes, in which Mr Babaee appeared.
He says the house has seen a host of celebrity visitors including will.i.am, Amy Winehouse, Geri Halliwell and the Jackson brothers, although he stressed Michael never came round.
He told The Times that he is prepared to redevelop it with whatever facilities anyone interested in buying the property would like adding, “I can do it 20 per cent cheaper than your average homeowner, and deliver it on time.”
Kam Baebee. Picture: Instagram
The decision to sell came after the acrimonious break up of his 28-year marriage with Roya and his intention to star a new life with his 29-year-old Czech girlfriend Ana Totoc.
He has also recently had legal problems relating to a dispute about the refurbishment of a house in Chiswick for celebrity nail artist Leighton Denny who had complained about a persistent damp problem in his new designer home.
Mr Baebee was ordered by the High Court to pay £730,000 plus further potential costs as the bill for putting the property right was calculated. Mr Denny said the problems made the home unfit to live in and the cost of putting it right had already reached half for what he had paid for it.
One of the living rooms in the property. Picture: Hamptons
He currently lives in a garden flat in Mayfair but intends to use the proceeds of the sale to buy a larger place.
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October 5, 2023
