Cypriot national John Fredriksen selling $337m London mansion as he abandons UK

One of the richest people in the United Kingdom, shipping billionaire and Cypriot national John Fredriksen, is reportedly selling his 300-year-old Georgian manor in London a month after he declared “Britain has gone to Hell.”

Fredriksen appears to be joining a mass exodus of super wealthy residents leaving the UK, listing the abolition of the UK’s non-dom status as a key factor.

According to multiple reports in the English media, Fredriksen has reportedly fired more than a dozen domestic employees and is arranging for discreet viewings of the 30,000-square-foot mansion known as The Old Rectory, cementing his departure from Britain.

The Old Rectory in Chelsea is one of Britain’s most expensive houses at an estimated $337 million (€288 million) and includes 10 bedrooms, a ballroom and two acres of land—the third-largest private gardens in London.

The move to sell the famous property comes one month after Fredriksen blamed the abolishment of non-domicile tax status (which previously allowed non-citizen residents to only pay British taxes on the money they earned in the country) for his decision to leave the UK.

He confirmed to E24, a Norwegian publication, that he was relocating to the United Arab Emirates and declared, “the entire western world is on its way down".

Fredriksen closed the London headquarters of Seatankers Management, one of his private shipping businesses, earlier this year.

Fredriksen is just the latest of the United Kingdom’s super wealthy residents to leave the country. Britain is losing millionaires and billionaires faster than any of the other wealthiest countries in the world, according to Henley & Partners, and 16,500 millionaires are expected to leave this year.

Tax reforms—including a hike in inheritance tax, 15% value-added tax on private school fees and shifts in the residence-based tax system—have all made the UK increasingly unattractive to high-net-worth investors, Henley reports.

The Old Rectory in Chelsea dates back to the 1720s

The Old Rectory in Chelsea dates back to the 1720s and the site was formerly home to the rector of Chelsea parish church, which dates back to 1157. It was refurbished in the 1990s and sold to Greek shipping magnate Theodore Angelopoulos in 1995 for $30 million (€25.6m), after which it long held the record for London's largest and most expensive property sale. Fredriksen bought the property for $50 million (€42.7m) in 2001 and reportedly turned down an unsolicited $135 million (€115.4 million) offer from Russian business oligarch Roman Abramovich to buy the property in 2004.

Fredriksen, an 81-year-old Cypriot national, was the 136th-richest person in the world as of 21 July. He has an estimated net worth of €14.8 billion, which he made in the oil and shipping businesses. Today, his empire includes oil tankers, dry bulkers, LNG carriers and deepwater drilling rigs. He is expected to hand control of his empire to his twin daughters, Cecilie and Kathrine Fredriksen.

(Source: Forbes)