4 bedroom detached house for sale
This is not a typical rural house sale. 5 Laughton Lodge is an architect-designed four-bedroom home (1,672 sq ft), set within one of England’s longest-established co-housing communities, six miles from Lewes. Laughton Lodge extends to 23 acres of shared land, bordered directly by mixed woodland which stretches back almost without interruption for around 500 acres, with open farmland in every other direction. The sense of space, when you arrive, is immediate.
Key facts
- 4 bedrooms (including ground-floor room with en suite)
- 3 reception rooms
- 2 bathrooms
- 1,672 sq ft
- Architect-designed timber-frame construction, built 1999
- Recently refurbished throughout to a high standard
- Vaulted sitting room with windows from ground floor to top of gable end
- 26-foot kitchen and dining space opening onto the garden
- Underfloor heating (ground floor), central heating (first floor) and wood-burning stove
- South-facing garden with timber decks, paved terraces, raised beds and fruit trees
- Large attic storage space
- Off-road parking
- Walking distance to Laughton village, with pub, shop and primary school
- 9,999-year lease
- EPC Band C
- Guide price £1,150,000
The house
The house has been designed around light and daily use rather than statement. The floor plan follows the movement of the sun; glazing is expansive; there are landscape or woodland views from every room and a quality of natural light that photographs don’t quite capture. There are four bedrooms, including a ground-floor room with en suite. The galleried first-floor landing allows the house to feel open to the landscape, without feeling exposed. The internal space is designed for flow and feels larger than the square footage measures.
A 26-foot kitchen and dining space opens directly onto the garden and forms the centre of the house. The sitting room is vaulted, calm, and can be made cosier on winter nights with the wood-burning stove. Windows, extending from ground floor to the top of the gable end, give views of the landscape throughout the day and into the evening. There is underfloor heating on the ground floor and central heating upstairs.
The house has been recently refurbished to a high standard throughout.
The garden
Outside, the garden has timber decks, paved terraces, raised beds, and a roll-top bath set beneath the trees, open to the sky. Materials are simple: timber cladding, sandstone paving, oak sleepers. The garden space allows for grasses to grow full height in summer for biodiversity, through which paths wind. Fruit trees (pear, apple, plum, cherry and greengage) border both sides.
Price and tenure
Guide price: £1,150,000
The property is held on a lease of 9,999 years from 1999, granted by The Community Project Limited. Each leaseholder is a member and director of the freeholder company, which owns the land and shared buildings. This is a freehold for all practical purposes.
What is Laughton Lodge?
The community – what it means (and what it doesn’t)
Laughton Lodge is a self-managed community of 22 households on a jointly owned site. Each household owns its home on a 9,999-year lease.
The community is structured, experienced, and deliberately light-touch. Participation beyond the essentials is a matter of personal preference. Privacy is assumed rather than negotiated. This does not mean constant meetings or enforced sociability. For some residents, co-housing translates into a shared meal on a Friday night, or office and studio space close to home. For others, it means that children have the freedom to roam safely. The land is genuinely shared rather than subdivided, and daily life unfolds with less friction than in most neighbourhoods.
Around 70 people live here, from babies to those in their eighties. Many are families, and children are at the heart of everyday life. Some residents commute to Lewes, Brighton or London; others work from home using the shared offices and co-working spaces on site.
For those new to co-housing: Laughton Lodge has been running since 1998, its governance is well established, and buying in means joining something that already works.
Location
Laughton Lodge is on the edge of the village of Laughton, in the heart of the Sussex countryside, surrounded by over 400 acres of woodland. The village has a primary school, a pub, and a community-owned village shop and post office, all within walking distance.
There are secondary schools in Ringmer (3 miles, accessible independently by bus), Uckfield and Lewes. The property is also well located for independent schools including Lewes Old Grammar School and Bede’s.
Lewes and Uckfield are both less than 15 minutes away by car, with regular train services to London and Brighton. From Lewes station it’s just over an hour direct to Victoria and London Bridge. The nearest bus stop is less than 10 minutes’ walk, with half-hourly services to Lewes, Brighton and Eastbourne. Brighton and the coast are approximately 30 minutes by car.
The South Downs National Park, Glyndebourne, and the East Sussex coast are essentially on your doorstep. For those working hybrid or remotely, what you gain in landscape and space is considerable, and what you give up in commute time, for most working patterns, is modest.
Get in touch
For more information or to arrange a viewing, call Hazel or Ben on 07961 373 385, or email mail@benmetz.org.