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House with 15m underground tunnels for sale for 300k

https://www.readingchronicle.co.uk/news/26612080.house-15m-underground-tunnels-sale-300k/
53•librasteve•1h ago

Comments

librasteve•1h ago
sorry for the ads … but this made me smile
throooooo•43m ago
You'd probably be interested in this person's work: https://youtu.be/6CLF4QrYmYg
librasteve•37m ago
oh yeah! tunnel merch
ljf•8m ago
Ha I came to see if anyone had posted her. I love her Instagram, so much of it is the logistics of moving all the rock out and supplies in. Fascinating problems to solve on a small scale.
hermitcrab•21m ago
The online versions of local British Newspapers are almost unreadable now with all the chumbox ads and continual page repainting. Ugh.
tejohnso•16m ago
I didn't see a single ad. Why not use an ad blocker, or just use Brave?
looperhacks•53m ago
lowercase m. 15 meters, not 15 million tunnels :D

If you're interested in secret tunnels, check out Colin Furze on Youtube!

hidelooktropic•48m ago
Thank you. I definitely read this as million.
wincy•48m ago
If you’re instead interested in a book about a house with 15 million tunnels, read House of Leaves!
wafflemaker•19m ago
This is a very scary horror, tho the book (like other books by the author) is published in a very quality way.
librasteve•47m ago
oops … sorry … now fixed
foobarian•46m ago
That is still an impressive water table. I wish ours was that low :-)
shagie•38m ago
Relatively secluded and private, Seymour Cray was also a tunneler... he wouldn't have been making videos about it

The story about him in Time at the time: https://web.archive.org/web/20080521163217/http://www.time.c...

    For Cray, the excavation project is more than a simple diversion. "I work when I'm at home," he recently told a visiting scientist. "I work for three hours, and then I get stumped, and I'm not making progress. So I quit, and I go and work in the tunnel. It takes me an hour or so to dig four inches and put in the 4-by-4s. Now, as you can see, I'm up in the Wisconsin woods, and there are elves in the woods. So when they see me leave, they come into my office and solve all the problems I'm having. Then I go back up and work some more."
And an article someone wrote later... https://michael-starobin.squarespace.com/blogcontent/digging...
dotancohen•51m ago
That 15 meters underground, not 15 million tunnels.
rzzzt•43m ago
The title is "not even" clickbait, just very confusing.

"The unique complex contains more than 1,300 square feet of underground space, including tunnels and storage rooms - and even a hand-built railway."

(Edit: I mean the original article, not the submission)

librasteve•40m ago
well I (the submitter) messed up and wrote 15M in the submission title (note the cap) in error just to add to the confusion (now fixed, soz.) … I thought “best” just to repeat the article title
rzzzt•31m ago
No worries, I take issue with the person who concocted the original title. I got here after the capital-M change and it was still confusing that they didn't mention the space that was dug out at this depth, instead paint a picture of a system of tunnels under a normal house(?)
librasteve•43m ago
sorry for the capital M … I have fixed in the title to 15m as in metres

that’s ~ 45 ft underground, I believe … perhaps not that impressive, but quite funny since I would hesitate to undermine my own house and surely this makes it worth less

werdnapk•44m ago
So you just go digging under neighbours properties? What about underground infrastructure?
Sharlin•37m ago
I don’t think it extends beyond property limits.
aeve890•43m ago
15 meters deep underground in 4 levels, not just a 15 meters long tunnel.
fusslo•42m ago
I, too, one day dream of using my children as labor for my underground tunnel system. To fight the ant, you must become the ant

I'm joking, but it's heartening to see quirky hobbies by qualified people (he was a civil engineer).

spyspy•22m ago
Homes need more whimsey. I recently discovered one of my interior doorways is actually a stone archway that someone had squared off, drywalled and installed a cheap hollow door for no apparent reason. Working with a stonemason to re-point/parge it and bring it back to glory. Will I ever see a return on this investment? Probably not but fuck it it'll make my house just that much cooler.
hermitcrab•20m ago
If I had 6 children, I would probably take up tunnelling.
WithinReason•9m ago
The children yearn for the mines
runako•40m ago
Researching what the article meant by "rocket" (I assumed it was a Britishism), I found this article that includes more pictures.

https://www.aol.com/articles/unassuming-bungalow-hides-netwo...

librasteve•39m ago
aol wtf
Steaglsz•7m ago
AOL has never done me dirty, asked for me to buy cloud data, auto deleted emails. Aim account still going strong for email
samstress•40m ago
One room even features a secret entrance — hidden inside a rocket by the pool. — Ey — pshhh! :-)

I used to live in the inner city of Leipzig during my university days, and we had a door in the basement that led to wartime tunnels connecting it to other houses. It wasn't like a massive maze, just a hub with three other paths, each leading to another house nearby. From there, however, if they'd unlocked their doors, you could travel farther.

I was on a mission back then to befriend and convince random neighbours across the street to open their access doors and get some kind of network going, but I didn't meet with much enthusiasm.

pluc•30m ago
Underground kiez would kill in Berlin
librasteve•30m ago
Reading (the largest town in the UK btw) has other tunnels … for example https://www.readingchronicle.co.uk/news/14492484.sneak-a-pea... and there is a rumour of secret escape tunnels from the (medieval) abbey.
hermitcrab•26m ago
Swindon has a significantly larger population than Reading.
librasteve•19m ago
dang … guess I am stuck in 1961 https://www.visionofbritain.org.uk/census/EW1961PRE/1?utm_so...

fwiw I just threw this in since many on HN probably don’t know much about Reading

red face

dgrin91•39m ago
Maybe I missed it through all the ads, but it's pretty disappointing that there is no direct link to the listing?
thorin•16m ago
This is the listing. You can click through pictures of it all. The rocket entrance is amazing.

https://www.btgeddisonspropertyauctions.com/properties/20260...

artisinal•36m ago
Freestanding house with a pool for 300k? That is incredibly cheap. Perhaps I should move there.
gib444•30m ago
Suspiciously cheap. There are no detached (what we call 'freestanding') properties on Right Move in the area under £400k. The cheapest is £450k

EDIT: oops, forgot to select the 'Bungalow' filter too (ugh). 2 properties: £375k and £350k (very small, 60m2). Still...nothing detached around £300k

EDIT2: ohh auction...230m2...yeh won't go for £300k, way more

bluGill•26m ago
UK money. Still that works out to about $400k in us dollars. You can find better deals in the US, but probably none with tunnels - and unlikely to be places you want to live though not bad places (bad places in the US that would be around $120k)
hermitcrab•24m ago
It does seem cheap for a house in Reading, even factoring in that it is a bungalow. Maybe they factored in increased subsidence risk?
manarth•23m ago
Auction pricing.

It'll start out at £300k (to market it attractively) and end up selling for £500k+.

aeyes•5m ago
Check the pictures, this doesn't look like a house to me. 2 levels of workshop areas and an office area. Also the swimming pool is in the front yard, thats a weird one.
x187463•36m ago
Colin Furze has entered the chat.
_jholland•32m ago
The listing of the property on the auction site:

https://www.btgeddisonspropertyauctions.com/properties/20260...

It includes many more photos than the article, as well as floor plans for the subterranean areas

librasteve•29m ago
I claim 1% commission if anyone on HN buys it
idbnstra•27m ago
it seems as though it hath been hugged to death
meindnoch•30m ago
Reminds me how rich people in historic areas of London took on the habit of extending their properties downwards, keeping the above-ground parts intact due to conservation laws.

Then everyone acted surprised when entire streets started sinking, or whole buildings collapsed into the ground: https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2020/nov/03/london-stree...

jvanderbot•29m ago
would love to see the radon measurements in those tunnels/basement.
fred_is_fred•27m ago
Is that an issue in the UK?
hermitcrab•23m ago
It is in some areas with a lot of granite, such as Cornwall. I'm not aware it is a factor in Reading.
wafflemaker•9m ago
Granite tends to contain Radon as it's in the decay chain of Uranium, which is often found in Granite.
jvanderbot•23m ago
It comes out of the ground. UK has some of that I think.

Tunnels and basements just trap it so it can't blow away.

manarth•19m ago
In granite bedrock areas such as Cornwall, yes, radon is a significant concern that requires measurement and usually remediation (extraction fans).

The chalk bedrock in Reading isn't generally susceptible to radon.

UK radon mapping data: https://www.ukradon.org/information/ukmaps

TYPE_FASTER•28m ago
Cool! Here's another example of a tunnel house: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Forestiere_Underground_Gardens
TheOtherHobbes•20m ago
300k in Tilehurst for a house with a pool is incredibly cheap.

[Looks at interior photos]

Ah. Anyway.

Curious how he got planning permission. Or if he got planning permission.

traxler•16m ago
This misses the most important question.

Why is it for sale?

Archit3ch•12m ago
15 meters is a tragedy. 15 million is a statistic.
Luc•9m ago
What are those dark brown cylinder shapes in the sides of the roughly hewn tunnel (first image on the right)?
andai•2m ago
The masculine urge to dig...
Freak_NL•34m ago
I wasn't impressed by the 15 metres, but it turns out that is the maximum depth reached, not the length of a tunnel.
Scubabear68•29m ago
I read it as 15 million tunnels too, was very confused. Thank you!
kzrdude•26m ago
I figured 15 meters tunnel is not worth mentioning, so had to be 15 miles.
tecleandor•10m ago
Yeah, I though it was 15 meters of length, not that impressive... but it is 15m underground and '... 1,300 square feet of underground space, including tunnels and storage rooms'.
hermitcrab•9m ago
Swindon has been growing like crazy. ~92,000 in 1961 to ~233,000 in 2021. Passing Reading's population in the 90s.

>many on HN probably don’t know much about Reading

Maybe it is better that way. ;0)

jimlikeslimes•2m ago
I thought it was made city status a while back too!
yourusername•3m ago
There's a bunch of potentially unpermitted tunnels under the property. Quite the liability.
louthy•7m ago
Very much so.

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House with 15m underground tunnels for sale for 300k

https://www.readingchronicle.co.uk/news/26612080.house-15m-underground-tunnels-sale-300k/
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