PH Homes poised to snap up Altrincham’s Downs Quarter 

The housebuilder is the frontrunner to acquire The House Crowd’s stalled residential scheme out of receivership, Place North West understands. 

Cheadle-based PH Homes has been selected as the preferred bidder for the 40-home Altrincham project. The company declined to comment on the Downs Quarter deal when contacted.

The Hale Road site is valued at between £2m and £2.5m, according to a report by Landwood Group, prepared for professional services firm Cowgills.

Cowgills is the administrator for House Crowd Developments 23, the vehicle of peer-to-peer lender The House Crowd that was delivering the project.

Landwood also estimates that it would cost around £6.2m to complete the scheme.

Designed by Calderpeel Architects, the project comprises 31 apartments across three blocks, and eight townhouses. The development is between 60%-70% complete,

The House Crowd brought in Quantuma as administrators due to “ongoing financial issues” earlier this year. 

Quantuma is also conducting administration proceedings for group companies House Crowd Property Management, House Crowd Finance, and House Crowd Finance (Security Agent).

Following the appointment of administrators, LPA receiver David Currie & Co was appointed to sell the development to recover a £750,000 charge held by developer Consensus Property over House Crowd Developments 23.

Altrincham-based The House Crowd, which offered bridging loans secured against land or property, bought the Downs Quarter development site from Consensus in 2019. 

The House Crowd, founded in 2012 by Suhail Nawaz, has 3,700 active investors and has funded more than 400 developments worth a combined £123.9m, according to Quantuma.