MYSTERY surrounds the crumbling mansion where TV legend Bruce Forsyth spent his final years
The once-glamorous home sits abandoned on Britain’s “ghost town” ultra-exclusive Wentworth Estate.
It has been left rotting for years despite being sold for £5.7million in April 2020 after the star’s death three years earlier.
Locals say the eerie silence surrounding the property has only deepened as neighbouring mansions across the estate also stand empty and decaying.
Once home to golfing stars, celebrities and footballers, the luxury Surrey estate has become littered with deserted mega-mansions.
Famous names linked to homes there over the years include Elton John, late Formula One boss Eddie Jordan, golfers Ernie Els and Rory McIlroy, and England skipper Harry Kane.
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But three years after Bruce’s death, widow Lady Wilnelia sold the mansion – Straidarran – and virtually nothing appears to have happened there.
The once-luxurious home – complete with a 10-seater cinema, swimming pool, tennis court, gym, library and wine cellar – has seemingly been left untouched for years.
Locals also told this paper that there is no sign of anybody living there, nor any refurbishments occurring either – as these new exclusive images show.
One local told The Sun: “Normally overseas owners on the estate knock these old homes down and build a new one.
“So it is a very strange situation with Bruce’s old home, where seemingly nothing has happened since Wilnelia sold it six years ago.
“The only thing I have noticed is that security is present there, the owners certainly aren’t, but that only followed break-ins.
“I wonder if the owner is paying for the security or whether it was the estate themselves.”
Warning signs up on the gates of the property, which still features an “F” crest linked to Forsyth’s surname.
Earlier this year, security was stepped up after urban explorers targeted the mansion, with police confirming reports of the break-ins.
Estate manager James Perotin previously told The Sun: “Security has been increased at Bruce Forsyth’s old house, there is now a van permanently on site, and it is monitored 24 hours a day.”
He added that many wealthy homeowners on the estate now spend much of their time abroad “because of tax reasons”, leaving some mansions sitting empty for years.
For more than 75 years, Bruce entertained millions of viewers with hit shows including The Generation Game, Play Your Cards Right and Strictly Come Dancing.
The TV icon stepped back from presenting in 2014 after a decade fronting Strictly before tragically dying from bronchial pneumonia in 2017 aged 89 at the mansion he called home for decades.
Widow Wilnelia later downsized to another property on the same estate – which she bought for £3million – after selling the mansion in April 2020.
Today, the abandoned property is one of the starkest symbols of the bizarre decline of one of Britain’s richest private estates.
It is though that around half of the homes on the estate are sitting empty behind locked gates and round-the-clock security patrols.
