Wedding gurus sued over claims they hid dry rot when promoting £2m house
A homeowner is suing luxury wedding gurus who sold him a £2million country pile, claiming they deliberately hid dry rot fungus and a series of ‘hidden defects’ from him.
Alastair and Carla Winsey are facing accusations that they ‘scraped off visible evidence of dry rot fungus from timbers’ at their former home, The Old Vicarage, in the Berkshire village of Grazeley.
The eight-bedroom home was then sold to Matthew Gore and his fiancée Kim Gozzett in 2018.
Mr Gore claims the former homeowners deliberately concealed the fungus, as well as serious structural defects, which will force him to demolish and rebuild part of his new home.
He is now suing Mr and Mrs Winsey – proprietors of luxury Hampshire wedding venue Silchester Farm – for £1.2million, which he says is the difference between the £2million purchase price and the true value of the eight-bed property once the defects had been uncovered.
Carla (left) and Alistair Winsey (right) are being sued for allegedly concealing fungus at a property they sold for £2million in 2018
The Old Vicarage (pictured) is an eight-bedroom home in the Berkshire village of Grazeley. It was then sold to Matthew Gore and his fiancée Kim Gozzett in 2018
Mr Gore is also suing the surveyors – Haslams Surveyors Llp – who assessed the state of the property before he agreed to buy it.
But Mr and Mrs Winsey are denying any wrongdoing, branding the claim against them ‘opportunistic’ and insisting they knew nothing about dry rot being present.
They are also claiming Mr Gore had fair warning about other potential issues before he signed the contract to buy.
In papers lodged with London’s High Court, lawyers say that The Old Vicarage, on Church Lane in Grazeley was sold by the Winseys in July 2018 for £2,007,872.
The high-end property features a swimming pool and tennis court.
It was initially bought by the Winseys in 2014 for £1.12million before being extensively refurbished.
But the couple are now facing damaging allegations that they concealed the ‘hidden defects’ in their beautiful Berkshire home, boosting its sale price by over £1million.
Representing Mr Gore, Rupert Higgin, in documents lodged with the High Court says: ‘In this claim, the claimant, Mr Gore, seeks damages against the Winseys for having misrepresented certain facts about a property which he bought from them.
‘It was subsequently discovered that there was progressive movement in the roof and front wall of the former Coach House, causing that section of the property to be structurally unsound, and requiring its demolition and rebuilding.
‘The claimant has accordingly had to expend substantial sums in investigatory and remedial works to the above defects in order to render the property safely inhabitable.
In court, Mr Higgin told Judge Anneli Howard KC: ‘£2million was paid for a property worth only £865,000.’
Mark Warwick KC, representing the Winseys, dismissed the claim against them as ‘opportunistic and misconceived.’
Behind The Old Vicarage in Berkshire is a swimming pool for the home owners to enjoy
An aerial view of the eight-bedroom country pile shows a pool house behind the property
The dining room is painted a pale grey and features a long wooden table. Alistair and Carla’s initials can be seen on a tastefully decorated shelf to the left
A living room in the country pile boasts a fireplace and bay window painted a duck egg blue
He said: ‘The Winseys did not know that dry rot had been present in the property during the period of their ownership of the property.
‘The claimant’s figure of £1.2million is extremely high. I understand that something like £600,000 has been spent on dry rot work.
‘The typical buyer, if told a house has dry rot, shrugs their shoulders and says “ok but I like it. I’ll pay £200,000 less”.
‘The claimant’s decision to buy the property was based upon the report, and not upon any alleged representations by the Winseys.’
Benjamin Fowler, for Haslams Surveyors Llp, told the judge: ‘The claim against Haslams disregards significant sections of its report, including repeated advice to the claimant to carry out/commission further investigations into damp in areas of the ground floor of the property before exchange of contracts, which advice the claimant failed to follow.
‘We warned the claimant that the risk of dry rot was high.’
The case reached court in a pre-trial hearing before Judge Howard KC, during which the parties discussed issues relating to expert evidence.
Mr Fowler also set out the increasing cost of the case.
He told the judge: ‘The parties have already spent £350,000 on this and half of that is from the claimant.’
It is now set to return to court at a later date.After renovating their home in Berkshire, ‘self taught restorers and decoraters’ Mr and Mrs Winsey turned their attention to the wedding business they run at Silchester Farm – a sprawling six-bed Hampshire home based on an 18th century farmhouse with outbuildings.
The wedding venue at Silchester Farm in Hampshire on a sunny day
The Winseys say that since acquiring Silchester Farm, they have transformed it into a luxury ‘rural retreat and wedding venue’.
The farm has its own boating lake and guest accommodation as well as a series of historic rustic barns perfect for tying the knot and celebrating afterwards.
Loved-up couples can pay up to £25,000 a day to hire Silchester Farm for a wedding with in-house catering.
