Why Brits are buying homes in Saint Lucia

https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/why-saint-lucia-is-now-going-with-a-swing-b69q995cc

April 26 2023, 12.01am

Soufrière, a town on the west coast of Saint Lucia

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On the northern tip of Saint Lucia, facing out across the waves of the Atlantic towards Martinique, the 15th tee of the Caribbean’s newest golf course is an exceptional challenge. It looks impossible: 190 yards from a blind back tee directly across the foaming spray to a sloping green opposite, all in a whip-sharp headwind. Ben Crenshaw, a two-time Masters winner and ex-Ryder Cup captain turned golf course designer, demonstrates how to play it. He steps up, has a couple of practice swings and then lets rip, landing his ball perfectly.

Crenshaw is here not to show off his golfing skills, but to promote the latest course he has co-designed, Point Hardy at Cabot Saint Lucia, one that even a non-golfer can sense is something special. It’s certainly challenging, with five overwater holes, four in a row on the back nine, but it’s also majestically scenic, a series of valleys and elevations hugging 1.5 miles along Saint Lucia’s coastline.

The course will be the cornerstone of Cabot Saint Lucia, a 375-acre residential and leisure development of around 300 properties that’s setting a new price point for the north of the island. Prices start at $1.6 million (£1.28 million) for a plot, with typical build costs of $1,000 a sq ft, putting the total price of a detached, spacious three-bedroom home with swimming pool and garden at around $5.1 million. With neighbouring plots at the gated Mont du Cap estate at $17 a sq ft — $535,000 for three quarters of an acre — who will pay these prices?

The dramatic 15th tee on the Point Hardy golf course — part of the new Cabot Saint Lucia development in the north of the island

JACOB SJYMAN

“If Saint Lucia wasn’t an amazingly beautiful destination, 67 per cent of it rainforest with a beautiful coastline, this project wouldn’t have worked, but golf is the major differentiator here,” says Ben Cowan-Dewar, co-founder and chief executive of Cabot. “Buyers who come to Cabot Saint Lucia will see the quality of one of the world’s great golf courses and then will discover the award-winning architecture, great restaurants and excellent facilities, beach clubs, fitness centre and kids clubs, that we are building.”

Cowan-Dewar, a fresh-faced 45, has already created Canada’s top-rated golf course at Cabot Cape Breton in remote Nova Scotia. His Canada-based company, Cabot, has five residential resorts worldwide including Cabot Highlands in Inverness. He scoured the Caribbean for sites, focusing on islands with Commonwealth links and good flight capacities, and in 2016, found Point Hardy, then bank-owned after the failure of a planned pre-2008 residential project around a Raffles hotel.

Cabot Saint Lucia has already sold 67 plots, mostly to North American buyers

“The site has all the drama,” he says. “Great biodiversity, a unique microclimate, long views including to the World Heritage Pitons [twin volcanic spires]. There are lots of great golf courses on coastlines, but not on coastlines like this, winding in and out over rocky outcrops, soft sand beaches and over lush terrain.”

The golf course opens for preview play this summer. So far, 67 plots at Cabot Saint Lucia have sold, almost exclusively to buyers from North America. Phase two, now for sale, includes 12 Fairway Villas with three and four bedrooms for $3.5 million each. Future phases will include villas and apartments by the beach.

Figures from the estate agency Savills show that 90 per cent of buyers in Saint Lucia are British, but the island now has direct flights from seven North American airports including Toronto, New York and Chicago.

“There are 140 million people in the northeastern USA who have to deal with harsh winters, and while historically most visitors to Saint Lucia were British, many more North Americans are coming,” says Cowan-Dewar. “I also think there’s a generation of British buyers who have sat on the sidelines and now have the pent-up desire to invest in a high-quality holiday home.”

It’s a view reinforced by David Farrin of Doubloon Real Estate. From his office overlooking the idyllic Pigeon Island on Saint Lucia’s northwest coast, he describes a “booming” market.

“Last year was our best year for sales since before 2008, with inquiries up 50 per cent on 2019,” he says. “There’s demand for properties priced between $1.5 million and $2.5 million, and lock-up-and-leave homes from $500,000. Many clients are 50-somethings with families who can work from home and keep British hours, getting up at 4 or 5 am and then heading to the beach after lunch. When the pound went to $1.05 there was a slight pull-back, but that seems to have passed. People are focused on lifestyle.”

Cap Maison, in the north of the island, is a hotel resort with one to three-bedroom villas priced from $550,000 (£440,000); doubloonrealestate.com

Property for sale starts from $500,000 for a two-bedroom apartment with communal pool in Rodney Bay, the business and tourism centre, and from $1.5 million for a three-four-bedroom house and pool. Farrin’s top sales price in the past year was $4.5 million.

“The best infrastructure of activities, bars, restaurants and shops is in the north around Rodney Bay and Cap Estate,” Farrin says. “Saint Lucia is a beautiful island, the topography is exceptional. The main problem is the shortage of stock with so little new development. Last year I had 105 properties on my books, this year I have 75.”

Established resorts selling well include Cap Maison and The Landings, both in the north. A beachfront two-bedroom apartment at The Landings, for sale at $850,000, has annual HOA [homeowners’ association] fees and insurance of $17,068 and received income from the rental pool of $42,307 last year, says Farrin.

Geraldine Waring first visited Saint Lucia in 2018 and now lives there from December to April

Geraldine Waring, a 72-year-old from London, first came to Saint Lucia in 2018 and immediately fell for island life, returning in February 2020 to recover post-surgery. “It was the start of Covid and when my flight home was cancelled, I decided to stay for four months,” she says. “I held yoga classes at the marina with donations going to Amy’s Gift, a charity set up in Amy Winehouse’s name. So many people came for two weeks in lockdown and stayed for six months, working from home.”

As a prizewinning body builder and pioneer of women’s fitness, having co-founded a chain of women-only gyms in the 1980s, she likes an active life. “The warmth here when London is cold and dark is wonderful,” she says. “I swim in the sea, practise yoga and have a real community of friends. Now I live here from December to April, returning to London for spring and summer.”

The most expensive completed properties for sale on the island are at Sugar Beach in the southwest — villas there have average prices of $4-5 million

The most expensive completed properties for sale on Saint Lucia are at Sugar Beach in the southwest, closer to the international airport and between the majestic Pitons, where the 95-acre Beau Estate, the former home of Princess Margaret’s long-term friend Colin Tennant, is for sale for $23 million. Penny Strawson is handling the sale as well as resales at the Sugar Beach resort itself.

“The villas at Sugar Beach, fully managed by the Viceroy Hotel, have average sale prices of $4-5 million and are achieving annual net rental returns of over $200,000,” says Strawson. “Last year saw huge pent-up demand. Saint Lucia has a rarity value over other Caribbean islands. With its rainforest, greenery, hills, waterfalls, beaches and the Pitons it is certainly more beautiful, and our capacity for flights is excellent, with both British Airways and Virgin Atlantic flying direct from London.”

Back at Cabot Saint Lucia, Andrew Alkenbrack, the head of sales for Cabot worldwide, is upbeat. “When we opened in Cape Breton, people said no-one would come because it was so remote. But they did come for the quality of the golf, making it Canada’s best golfing destination. Cabot Saint Lucia, with the best site on the planet for golf, is an enormous project that we’re doing from scratch, but the beauty of that is we can do it just how we want to.”

‘It’s the best thing we have ever done’

Toby Hutchinson, 55, the owner of a civil engineering company, and his partner Amy bought a four-bedroom villa in Marigot Bay on Saint Lucia’s western coast in 2021. “We had looked at property in Antigua and Barbados but thought Saint Lucia was especially beautiful and natural, and as soon as we saw this property, The Eye of Marigot, and the exceptional views and sunsets over the bay we knew it was the one,” says Toby. “I can honestly say it is the best thing we have ever done. We would have had to add a zero to the price tag to buy the equivalent in Barbados.”

Toby Hutchinson and partner Amy bought a villa in Marigot Bay in 2021

They paid $575,000, spending a further $40,000 on refurbishments. “Owning a house in the Caribbean means you do have to look after it or it goes downhill fast, but that is easily done here. We rent it out when we are not there and the rent, from $3,500 a week, covers the gardener, cleaners, our mortgage and upkeep. Last year we replaced the roof. It’s been a great investment, covering all our costs.”

The house is booked solidly from December to June this year, apart from five weeks over Easter when the couple are staying. They have no concerns on safety on the island. “I can understand why people might be have worries but we are from London and Saint Lucia feels safer. We’re not in a gated community. Our neighbour Pauline runs the rental company we use — Smooth Operators Property Management — and we live with the local expat community.”