Penny Churchill takes a look at the sale of the Leckie Estate, a huge swathe of land with a fine house at its heart, almost equidistant from Edinburgh and Glasgow.
A sign of the times is the launch onto the market of the scenic, 1,552-acre Leckie estate at Gargunnock, Stirlingshire, which is on the market for ‘offers over £5m’.
Savills sold it four years ago to the present owner, who has since improved the shoot and gained a number of planning consents, including permission for a substantial forestry-creation scheme.
Handily located in the heart of Scotland, seven miles from Stirling, 35 miles from Glasgow and 45 miles from Edinburgh, with Loch Lomond and The Trossachs National Park within easy reach to the west, the estate is again for sale through Savills, this time for ‘offers over £5m’ — though the vendor is willing to split it up into five lots.
An ancient and originally much larger estate owned by the Crown, Leckie was granted to Malcolm de Leky in the 1350s. The Leckies remained in possession until 1668, when the estate was sold to the Moir family of Craigarnhall, in whose hands it remained until 1906, when it was purchased by the 1st Viscount Younger, who came from a long-established Scottish brewing family.
It comprises a fine, five-bedroom country house in need of renovation, with planning consent to extend; the Knock-o-Ronald amenity farm with a farmhouse, cottages and farm buildings.
There are lochs, a grouse moor and an established pheasant and partridge shoot; four further residential properties; plus 1,418 acres on the Leckie Moor with existing forestry plantations and planning consent for a well-balanced conifer and broadleaf planting scheme.
A CGI image of the proposed new house at the Leckie Estate.
The topography of the land and the layout of the woodlands make for an exciting and challenging pheasant shoot, currently let to a local syndicate with Leckie’s owner receiving shooting in return.
Until recently, the moor has been let to a larger estate as part of a larger grouse shoot, but is now back in hand and could provide some walked-up grouse shooting.
The Leckie Estate is for sale at offers over £5 million — see more pictures and details.
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