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Saturday 11 October 2008

The ultimate trophy asset for the new-money elite

Dominic Prince says grouse shooting attracts the super-rich — and demand will keep estate prices rising

Other buyers have often made their fortunes in the investment world. Another purchaser last year was fund manager Stefano Roma, who splashed out £5.5 million for a moor, a keeper’s cottage and a game larder in County Durham, to add to the moor he already owns in South Yorkshire. Edinburgh-based fund manager John Dodd, of Artemis Fund Management, has a spectacular moor in Angus. Jeremy Herrmann of Ferox Capital has two moors, one in Yorkshire and one in Northumberland. But the nearest you’re likely to get to royalty in the new owners’ club is the motor-racing entrepreneur and former beau of Sarah Ferguson, Paddy McNally — yes, he’s got a grouse moor too.

Quite apart from the purchase price, a 10,000-acre moor will cost £200,000 per annum to run and although there are (incredibly, you might think, given the screamingly elitist nature of the sport) government grants available for the management of the moorland, you’ll still need colossal disposable income to take one on. Even if the moor remains dormant, with no shooting, the fixed costs can be around £75,000 a year. But that’s unlikely to impinge on the decision-making process of the wannabe grouse-moor owner. William Duckworth-Chad, an associate director of Savills specialising in grouse moor sales, says, ‘The reason these people have bought them is for enjoyment, not for income.’

But that doesn’t detract from the fact that the moors have proved to be a very good investment indeed. Jonathan Kennedy, of specialist land agent CKD Kennedy Macpherson, says, ‘Grouse moors have outperformed most other investments in the past ten years. The reason they are prospering is the investment put in to them by the new rich. Most of the old families couldn’t afford to put money into them. They were asset rich but cash poor.’ Quite the opposite of the new breed of owner.

The other reason they’ve proved to be such a good investment is that until recently nobody wanted them, so they could be had relatively cheap. Although the huge cost of running a moor could be partially offset by letting days out, the income at £75 per shot bird was minuscule.

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