AN ESTATE which was on the market for £20million has sold after just three weeks – for more than the guide price. The Tetworth Hall Estate, set in 102 acres of parkland near St Neots, was sold on Tuesday night last week just after The Hunts Post went to p

AN ESTATE which was on the market for £20million has sold after just three weeks - for more than the guide price.

The Tetworth Hall Estate, set in 102 acres of parkland near St Neots, was sold on Tuesday night last week just after The Hunts Post went to press.

The estate comes with 19 other houses and 2,500 acres of land divided into four farms all in an area south of St Neots and about a mile and a half west of Waresley.

The main house, a grade II listed Queen Anne mansion, built in red brick, has a coach house and gardener's cottage in its grounds as well as fine gardens.

Estate agent David Jones from Robinson and Hall, based in Bedford, said the estate had now been sold to business people and would once more become a family home.

The estate had been lived in by the Crossman family for the past 60 years until Jane Lady Crossman died in her 90s in January. Her children all have their own homes elsewhere so Tetworth Hall was up for sale.

Mr Jones said that bids were received even before the house was formally on the market.

The house, approached by a long drive, and covered in wisteria, is imposing but not rambling. It has seven bedrooms, three huge reception rooms, a massive entrance hall with a grand, curved staircase and a set of basement rooms that are currently the kitchen quarters, including a butler's sitting room.

Built in 1710, the house was redecorated and stylishly furnished in the 1960s, when the Crossman family bought it (having rented it since 1947). However, it has been barely touched since and has no central heating.

Though the property was up for sale either as a whole or in 22 lots, the new owners have bought the entire estate. Individually, the house was priced at around £3.5million and the cottages at around £250,000 each with the largest farm up for £5.5million.

Mr Jones said: "This was an unusual opportunity. Estates like this do not come on to the market very often. There could be another one next year - or there may not be another for 10 years."

The house has an illustrious list of owners. It was built as the home of John Pedley, then MP for Huntingdonshire. It was then owned by Edward Harley the 2nd Earl of Oxford and in 1740 by Philip Yorke, the 1st Earl of Hardwick and Lord Chancellor.

Other owners have included Charles Duncombe, 1st Lord Faversham, the Orlebar family - Augustus Orlebar was leader of the RAF team that won the Schneider Air Trophy for Britain in 1929 and he went on to become an Air Vice Marshall - and Sir Peter Crossman of the Mann, Crossman and Paulin brewing chain.