Chelsea Mansion's Dark Secret

0:00On May 1st, in the heart of Chelsea sits a 4-million-pound mansion that's falling apart, smashed windows, rats and foxes running wild, and a garden. Overrun by Japanese knotweed growing 10 feet high. The owner, former conservative counselor Nicholas Halberter, has held on to it for 43 years, but you never guess he's sitting on a 6-million-pound property portfolio. He rents out flats in his other Southeast London townhouses, pulling in around 72,000 pounds annually, even though neighbors describe. The places as disgusting with broken windows and birds flying inside. Back in the 80s and 90s, he and his late mother rented rooms in the Chelsea house, dealing with some rough tenants along the way. Locals call him the neighbor from hell, remembering traumatized lodgers he scared off, and the stench from dead rats in wildlife. Worst of all, police found a mummified body of his last lodger, an Irish builder named Frank, in the basement back in 2010, caused a known, but it shook.

1:01Everyone, even making rookie cops sick. Now, after dozens of neighbors petitioned, the local council hit him with a section 25 order, forcing him to clean up the mess, clear the knotweed, and fix the decay. Experts say removing that invasive weed could cost up to 20,000 pounds, and it's tanking nearby home values since buyers can't get mortgages. Halberters out there fundraising for veterans as head of the local Royal British Legion and giving cemetery tours, but this I saw next to his posh. Recolates has folks wondering how long he'll ignore the rot before the council steps in harder.