There’s a Forest Gate pub for sale but Phil Mellows is not buying it

The Rising Sun pub in Forest Gate — Ewan Munro, CC BY-SA 2.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Early doors at the Rising Sun and I’m first in. It’s a nice day so the friendly chap behind the bar asks me whether I’d like to drink my Guinness in the garden.

He leads me past the pool hall at the back and through a corridor into a small, neglected yard. He draws up a decent chair to catch a patch of sunshine and, with difficulty, drags an extremely heavy guano-spattered table into position by my elbow before disappearing back inside.

I’m here because the Rising Sun, on Romford Road in Forest Gate, is up for sale. Not that I’m buying. The price tag is an astonishing £6 million. Whoever’s in the market for this, they’re not interested in a run-down pub business.

The agent selling the freehold is Tyron Ash Real Estate, not one of the usual licensed property firms. Its website announces “luxury properties across the UK and Dubai” and there’s a photo of the team, young and smartly dressed, archly posed in front of a black marble counter upon which a woman in a bright red dress is, hilariously, half reclined.

What do they know of Forest Gate?

The advert on RightMove describes what we get for our £6 million. The pub itself, two bars and the pool room with its four tables and one of those punchball boxing machines you find at the fair, is taking £3,000 a week at the bar.

Even after adding on another grand in machine takings this is death-rattle loose change.

The business is no doubt kept alive by letting out a flat and 11 rooms on the two storeys above.

More than 10,000 square feet in total, the agent suggests it could be converted into 25 apartments or a hotel, “or even kept as a public house” on the ground floor.

But a buyer will surely need to spend millions more to attract the high roller tenants and guests that will deliver a return on their investment.

Can it add up? The Rising Sun is certainly in a pleasant corner of the Borough, and with the Elizabeth Line now providing fast access into central London it could make Forest Gate and Manor Park ripe for gentrification. Retaining the pub might even be a selling point.

But I’m not buying it. In any sense. My money is on us losing another boozer.

No news is bad news

Independent news outlets like ours – reporting for the community without rich backers – are under threat of closure, turning British towns into news deserts.

The audiences they serve know less, understand less, and can do less.

If our coverage has helped you understand our community a little bit better, please consider supporting us with a monthly, yearly or one-off donation.

Choose the news. Don’t lose the news.

Monthly direct debit

Annual direct debit

£5 per month supporters get a digital copy of each month’s paper before anyone else, £10 per month supporters get a digital copy of each month’s paper before anyone else and a print copy posted to them each month. £50 annual supporters get a digital copy of each month's paper before anyone else.