High Street, Billericay

Price £375,000 - Under Offer


  • COMMERCIAL FREEHOLD OPPORTUNITY IN BILLERICAY HIGH STREET
  • Quaint historic 2 Bedroom cottage behind the Chequers with established Business useage
  • The two bedrooms upstairs have been rented out as a single Office space
  • The left reception room downstairs has been Guys Hairdressers for over 20 years
  • The right reception room is presently a ladies Hairdressers, previously a nail salon amongst others
  • All share use of a Kitchen and WC
  • Gas Central Heating via radiators via a single Gas Fired Boiler in the Kitchen
  • Current Rateable Value of £6,500

A rare opportunity to acquire the Freehold of 'Chequers Cottage', A quaint historic character cottage arranged over two floors with a pitched tiled roof, built behind The Chequers Public House in Billericay High Street, itself dating back to 1769.

The layout comprises a Central small Hall with doors to the left and right and the stairs ahead. The left room is presently used as a 12sq m Gents Hairdressers with a door off to a Kitchenette and WC. The right room is presently a 10.9sq m ladies Hairdressers. Upstairs, the open plan office covers 26.4sq m.

There is Gas Central Heating via a modern Boiler in the Kitchen.

It has a rateable value of £6,500. (Current rateable value - 1 April 2017 to present).

There is no parking although Harry's Bar often has availability.


ENTRANCE

To the left side of The Chequers Pub is a little lane taking you through to the top of Chantry Way. Walking along here you reach Chequers Cottage which is built literally attached to the rear of the pub, with the front door facing straight on to the lane.

The entrance door leads into a small lobby with a set of stairs straight ahead rising to the first-floor landing of the cottage and doors to the left and right opening to the two main ground floor rooms.


LEFT FRONT ROOM 12ft 3' x 11ft 6' (3.7m x 3.5m)

This has been Guys Hairdressers for over two decades.

There's a front window and within this room is another internal door which leads through to the Kitchen.

A further internal door opens to reveal the large understairs cupboard.


KITCHEN 11ft 9' x 7ft max (3.6m x 2.1m)

With a rear window and fitted with a range of white kitchen units with wood effect worktops. incorporating a single bowl single drainer sink and a Breakfast Bar.

Wood effect laminate flooring runs into the adjacent WC and the original old fireplace still appears to be in situ, albeit boarded up.

Upon the wall, a Baxi 200 boiler serves the Gas Central Heating for the entire building.

A ledged external door opens out to the old 12ft 3' x 3ft 6' (3.7m x 1.1m) alley down the side of the cottage, now an enclosed 'outside space' with a gate out onto the lane between the Chequers and the Bakers on the other corner.


GROUND FLOOR WC ROOM 3ft 8' x 2ft 9' (1.1m x 0.84m)

Fitted with a white 'Cloakroom' suite comprising a close coupled WC and a wall mounted hand wash basin.


RIGHT FRONT ROOM 12ft 2' x 11ft 6' max (3.7m x 3.5m)

A ladies hairdressers called The Little Hair Boutique occupies this room.

With a front facing sash window, wood laminate flooring and the opening to the original fireplace has been plywood or plasterboarded in, although a vent indicates the chimney remains and so there is the possibility of it being reopened again.


Stairs from Hall to:

LANDING

Two doors either side of the landing open to each of the two offices with a further open space between the two once inside.


OFFICE ONE 12ft 8' x 10ft 6' (3.9m x 3.2m))

With a front facing original sash window, radiator, and loft hatch.


LINKING OPEN SPACE BETWEEN 5ft 8' x 4ft 6' (1.7m x 1.4m)

Ideal for filing cabinets etc.


OFFICE TWO 12ft 7' x 10ft 4' (3.8m x 3.15m)

Identical to the other office, with a front facing original sash window and radiator. One of the previous occupiers was a financial adviser, who had several lines put in. The sockets remain.


LOCATION

Chequers Cottage enjoys a very good location just off Billericay High Street with the mainline Railway Station within a 6-minute walk - accessing London Liverpool Street in 35 minutes.

Further up the High Street is a large Waitrose Store, complete with a cafe and numerous bus routes service this area allowing easy commutes in and out from all the main surrounding towns.



Business Rates
Basildon Council, Exempt

Notice
Please note we have not tested any apparatus, fixtures, fittings, or services. Interested parties must undertake their own investigation into the working order of these items. All measurements are approximate and photographs provided for guidance only.


Billericay is a popular, historic market town just 30 miles from London.

The market at the top of Crown Road disappeared years ago and Billericay nowadays is more well-known as an excellent commuter town, with excellent rail links to the City (35 minutes by train), very good schools and a charming High Street, part of which is a conservation area.

It also has great access to the key main roads of the M25, A12 and A127.

The town lies on the edge of rural Essex, which makes it a very desirable place to live. This coupled with the City access goes some way to explain the high levels of Londoners we see looking to move here every year.

Since I moved here in 1973 and started as an estate agent in the mid 1990's, I have seen the town grow to where it is now, with some 14,000-15,000 homes and a population of over 40,000.

The Billericay you see today is economically and physically a thriving and attractive place to live and work. There are many open green spaces including the 40 acre Lake Meadows Park, a must in summer, and they throw a pretty impressive Fireworks Night too.

Norsey Woods is a great place for a walk or to exercise your dogs...or the kids! It dates back to the Bronze Age and covers about 165 acres with a visitor centre for the educational visits it has too.
I remember camping there as a cub scout back in the day and both Nick and myself have enjoyed many a afternoon there over the years with our families.

The High Street must be one of the prettiest in the county and dates back to Roman times. The shape we see now certainly hasn't changed much for over 500 years, our office itself is part of one of the 25 old coaching inns the town has seen over the years!

With well over 100 shops including some well known names and some boutique locally owned ones, the High Street also has some great pubs, bars and restaurants. The Chequers is probably the most popular, most people we know rate it as the best pub in town, with newer bars like Harrys Bar, Bar Zero and the Blue Boar, also very sought after, growing venues on friday and saturday nights.

There are too many great restaurants to name, suffice to say you don't need to travel out of Billericay to have a fantastic night out and there's a taxi rank by the station to get you home if you want to leave the car on the drive.

Waitrose is our local main supermarket with there also a very good Co-op over on Queens Park. Smaller supermarkets over in South Green, Sunnymede and along Stock Road also provide a super local service in their areas.

Billericay Christmas Market is a very popular annual event which sees the High Street completely shut to traffic for the day and then filled with stalls selling anything and everything Christmasy!

All the local schools, both Primary and Secondary have good OFSTED reports and there is a good choice of both State and Private. Please feel free to contact our office for more details although the OFSTED website is the ideal first port of call of course.


A BIT OF HISTORY

Billericay has an facinating history, much of which can be researched in our local museum, the Cater Museum on the High Street.

Billericay was first recorded as Byllerica in 1291 with notable events including a Peasants Revolt ending up in Norsey Woods in 1381 and some of Billericay residents, including Christopher Martin, the ship's victualler, sailing with the Pilgrim Fathers to the 'New World' of America on the Mayflower in 1620 - hence the many representartions of the Mayflower ship in numerous local businesses and the Mayflower High School.

In 1916 Billericay became famous as a result of a Zeppelin airship crashing in flames on the outskirts of the town, down what is now Greens Farm Lane.

A union workhouse was built in 1840 which later, together with additional later built buildings, became St. Andrew's Hospital in the 1930s. The regional plastic surgery and rehabilitation unit was opened here the same year I moved to Billericay, 1973. Many a local will still refer the estate there now to me, as 'one of the houses on the old Burns Unit', although it is in fact Stockfield Manor now.
Only the original workhouse building, including the chapel, and the main gatehouse, now survive, converted now into Grey Lady Place, a residential development of luxury apartments.

The railway came in 1889 and opened up opportunities for landowners to sell plots to Londoners looking to move out of 'The Smoke' into a cleaner rural environment. Both myself and Nick have sold many an old 'plot land' home over the years for redevelopment. A few still remain on the edge of Norsey Woods down Break Egg Hill.

With the housing shortage created by the war time bombing of London, pressure to build was great and the new town of Basildon was given the green light. The 'Green Belt' stopped expansion and the blurring of Basildon and Billericay, hence why lot of the Billericay housing estates were built on abandoned farmland around the town centre and Great Burstead/South Green, where permission was more easily granted.
Floor Plan

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