Wright’s Clock Land CIO are delighted to announce that we have exchanged contracts (and will be completing on Wed 20th May) to purchase a portfolio of properties on the northern side of the High Street. This is a very big step forward for both Wright’s and for Fulbourn. It means that we have secured this important part of our community for the benefit of village residents.

To give more detail, and to explain the reasoning and implications of this purchase, we have put together the following series of Questions and Answers.

If you have other questions please contact us by email : steward@wrightsclockland.com

Q. What exactly have the Wright’s Clock purchased?

A. The portfolio of property comprises numbers 2 to 16 High Street, made up of eight retail units, seven self-contained flats, the car sales lot, and the large house at no 6 to 8. This Grade II listed building (with courtyard and large garage) is in poor repair and in need of significant refurbishment.

Q. How much has this cost the charity?

A. This information is commercially sensitive. However, the Trustees do not regard this as a cost, but rather a diversification of our investment portfolio. We have used funds previously invested in stocks and shares and transferred these into property. We expect that the income in rents that the portfolio will generate will be equal to (if not a little higher), than the returns we currently receive from our other investments. This income is used to make grants to village organisations.

Q. Why have you bought these properties?

A. When the properties came on the market it was a once in a generation opportunity to secure this important part of the High Street for the benefit of the village. If the portfolio had been purchased by property developers or a commercial organisation, the future use of the buildings would have been decided on the basis of commercial interest (subject of course to the usual planning controls). Now that the buildings are owned on behalf of Fulbourn residents, you can have a say in what might happen to them in future.

Q. So what is going to happen to them?

A. In the short term, probably very little. All the properties have either business or residential tenants occupying them. Their future is secure and their wishes will be respected. What it does mean is that if at some point in the future, a current business decided to re-locate, we can potentially shield the use of the buildings against commercial organisations that may not have community benefit as their main objective. Preference can be given to independent businesses, owned and run by local people, providing the type of services that Fulbourn residents want.

Q. What about the Grade II listed house?

A, This iconic building potentially dates back to the Fifteenth Century and is of historic importance. Whilst we are keen to bring an empty building back into use, the immediate need is to ensure that the structure and fabric of the building is secured and made safe. Longer term, we will be consulting with the wider community to decide how this building and its grounds could be used for the benefit of the village. We envisage that whatever the final use of the building, some form of conversion work will be required to make it fit for purpose.

Q. So what happens next?

A. Over the course of the next few months we are interested in finding out what Fulbourn residents want to happen. We are in the final stages of putting together a large-scale engagement exercise to generate ideas and hear your opinions. We hope that this will provide an opportunity for village residents to shape how their high street will develop over the coming years. In particular, we will be interested in people’s views about the potential longer-term use of the house, (bearing in mind the constraints we will face in converting and managing a listed building).

Q. How long will all this take?

A. We are in no hurry. We would rather take things slowly and get them right, rather than rush into them. Wrights Clock Fund have been around for five hundred years, so we are used to acting cautiously and working with long time horizons!