Historic Fife castle up for sale with £3.5m price tag

A historic castle in Fife with its own helicopter pad is up for sale with a £3.5 million price tag.

The B-listed Myres Castle, which dates back to the 16th century, is being marketed by Savills.

Set on a rise just outside the village of Auchtermuchty, it has ten ensuite bedrooms, a billiards room, 45 acres of grounds, a three-bedroom courtyard cottage, and comes complete with its own Bio-mass boiler for heating.

Jamie Macnab from Savills described it as “one of the very finest properties I have had the pleasure of marketing”. He said: “Myres Castle is a rare jewel and is likely to create something of a stir when we launch onto the market.”

Myres Castle is up for sale with a price tag of £3.5m

The property dates to the 16th century when John Scrymgeour, who oversaw the refurbishment of both Holyrood Palace and Falkland Palace for James V, built the original House of Myres in about 1530.

He later passed it to the Moncrieff family, who held it for nearly 200 years until it was bought by the King's Printer in 1820 before eventually becoming the dower house for nearby Falkland Palace in the 1870s.

In 1887 Myres Castle was sold to James Fairlie, who had been chamberlain to three Popes in Rome.

One of the ten bedrooms at Myres Castle

A walled garden was laid out in the style of one of the Vatican gardens. The property also includes a maze.

David Fairlie supervised the complete restoration of the castle in 1960 and it was refurbished again in 1999 when ensuite bathrooms were added to all ten bedrooms.

The oldest tree on the property is a Spanish chestnut on the front lawn, which, legend has it, was planted by Mary Queen of Scots on one of her many visits.

Mr Macnab said: “With its impeccable historic pedigree, glorious gardens and sensitive modernisation, Myres Castle is first and foremost a wonderful family home, but there is also an attractive commercial aspect with the cottage and gate lodge and exclusive use venue/events business all offering various income streams.”

And he added: “The prospect of heating a castle need not strike fear in the heart of a buyer with the biomass system already installed and significant financial incentives taking care of the heating costs.”