A former Premier League footballer’s derelict luxury home has been bought by a local family who are set to turn it into their dream home.
Former Liverpool and Arsenal winger Jermaine Pennant’s £3m five-bedroom mock Tudor home in Hale, Cheshire, was reportedly taken over by a drug gang and turned into a cannabis factory before two fires in the same month.
Yet the MailOnline can reveal Steve Leonard and his family are ready to return the house, called Tylacres, to its original glory.
Steve, 47, his wife Tina, 46, and their daughter Caitlin, 21, have been working 14-hour days at home to turn the derelict shell of Pennant’s old house into a ‘mansion’.
Steve told MailOnline: ‘We’ve had a lot of people saying just knock it out but I don’t want that, I want to keep its character.
Insert video: 2961499
A former Premier League footballer’s derelict luxury home has been bought by a local family who are set to turn it into their dream home.
Steve Leonard (pictured) and his family are ready to restore the house to its full potential
The house has fallen into disrepair since ex-footballer Jermaine Pennant moved out
Steve, 47, his wife Tina, 46, and their daughter Caitlin, 21, work from home 14 hours a day.
Leonard family hope to turn Cheshire mansion, which includes a pool, into a ‘palace’
Jermaine Pennant (pictured with his girlfriend Jess Impiazzi earlier this year) bought the house in 2006.
The former Arsenal and Liverpool winger’s home was worth £3million before it fell into disrepair. Photo: The house in its past glory days
Steve, who runs a property portfolio with his wife and daughter, could not bear to see the house demolished.
‘I’ve been here 20 years and it’s always made this house interesting, the prospect.’
After buying the house at auction for £570,000, Steve said he was prepared to spend ‘whatever it takes’ to get the house into shape so he and his family could move in.
However, the time frame for completing the house presented a challenge.
Steve and Tina, who run a property portfolio together, have sold their own house and now have just 12 weeks to finish Pennant’s old house.
Steve, who reckons they will spend another £400,000 building the mansion, said: ‘It’s something I’ve wanted to do for years.
‘[There’s] No chance I’m selling it.
‘My concern was that a developer would flatten everything and put two glass boxes.
‘We’re doing it as a family. Fourteen hour day. Home is in safe hands.
‘It will be a palace when I finish it. This will be our dream home.’
The 47-year-old admits that he has already faced several trials with the abandoned house.
He said most of the roof was damaged in the two fires, so the main part of the house would be just ‘brick walls’.
Steve told MailOnline: ‘We’ve had a lot of people saying just take it down but I don’t want that, I want to keep the character of it.’
He added: ‘I’ve been here for 20 years and it’s always made this house attractive, potentially.’
After buying the house at auction for £570,000, Steve said he was prepared to spend ‘whatever it takes’ to get the house into shape so he and his family could move into it.
Photos of the home’s interior show the level to which its structure has crumbled over the years
The football, as it bears the emblem of Liverpool Football Club, litters the 180-foot-wide garden.
Outside the house in the garden another football was spotted on the bracken that had been wild for a decade
Steve, who reckons they will spend another £400,000 building the mansion, said: ‘It’s something I’ve wanted to do for years.’
She added: ‘[There’s] No chance I’m selling it. My concern was that a developer would flatten everything and put two glass boxes’.
Meanwhile, the massive 180-foot-wide garden had grown wild and spiraled over a decade.
Steve said: ‘Getting through the front gate was the biggest challenge! It has been overgrown for 10 years.’
The luxury home was bought by Pennant in 2006 when he joined Liverpool and lived there for three years before moving to Spanish side Real Zaragoza.
He rented the house for about 10 years as his football career saw him move several times, including jobs in India and Singapore, before finally retiring in 2017.
Yet it has stood empty since 2020, after Pennant, 40, split from his then-partner Alice Goodwin, 33.
Steve and Tina have sold their own house and now have just 12 weeks to finish Pennant’s old house
He said: ‘It will be a palace when I finish it. This will be our dream home.’
The 47-year-old admits that he has already faced several trials with the abandoned house
He said the two fires had mostly damaged the roof, so the original part of the house would be just ‘brick walls’.
Meanwhile, the 180-foot-wide garden had been wild and spiraling out of control for a decade.
Steve said: ‘Getting through the front gate was the biggest challenge! It has been overgrown for 10 years’.
The wallpaper peels from every corner of the once £3million home
Television remotes and CDs litter the floor, which is dirty after all these years of empty space
There is even an old toy thrown in among the old things left in Pennant’s old house
The property is in the village of Hale in Cheshire, near Liverpool, and is called Tylacres
The kitchen is a complete mess and most of the house will need fixing, Steve told MailOnline
Local businessmen were then suspected of turning the property into a money-making cannabis farm.
A source previously said: ‘Jermain bought the house a few years ago when he played for Liverpool and lived there for about three years before moving to Spain where he spent some time before returning to Britain.
‘Toward the end of his career he played all over England and then ended up in India and Singapore before retiring about five years ago but in all that time he never returned home.
Local vendors suspected they had turned the property into a money-making cannabis farm
A source previously said: ‘Jermain bought the house a few years ago when he played for Liverpool and lived there for about three years before moving to Spain where he spent some time before returning to Britain.’
The source added: ‘He played all over England towards the end of his career and then ended up in India and Singapore before retiring about five years ago but never returned home in all that time.’
The luxury mansion even featured CCTV above a mock ‘Players’ Lounge’.
‘It was rented out for a few years and then the tenants left around 2020 and it’s been empty ever since – some dealers had moved out about a year ago and it was common knowledge that it was used as a cannabis farm.’
Born in Nottingham, Jermaine burst onto the scene as a teenager and signed for Arsenal aged just 15 for £2million, making his Gunners debut at 16.
He scored a hat-trick on his full Premier League debut at the age of 20. He later admitted that he had been partying until 6am on the day of the match and had won the match for his team’s hangover.
Light fixtures are hanging from the rafters after a group of marijuana dealers used the house as a drug farm.
Old furniture is strewn across the patio outside a home in Hale, Cheshire
In the middle of the circular driveway is a patch of overgrown grass with a hollow filled with water
Inside the house, old football shows were found in DVD cases, such as the Danny Dier feature
Steve will finish his job as he wants to be home with his family in just 12 weeks
Despite his remarkable start, he made just five full starts for Arsenal in seven years and was sent out on loan to various clubs where his personal problems continued.
He was jailed for three months in 2005 for drink-driving while disqualified after crashing his friend’s Mercedes into a lamppost. After 30 days in prison he was released and his club Birmingham City stood by him. He became the first player to play in the Premier League with an electronic ankle tag.
His football career continued with a big money move to Liverpool, earning him more cash and even a Champions League runners-up medal. During a highly paid spell at Real Zaragoza in Spain, he forgot he had a Porsche, leaving it with the keys on the seat outside a station.
About half a year later he realized what he had done and paid it off with five months worth of parking tickets.
Jermaine Pennant squandered his fortune and talent on an £80,000-a-week career. He was photographed with girlfriend model and actress Jess Impiazzi last year
Years of controversy – including a spell in prison – saw him become the first Premier League player to play with a tag. Now he has apparently lost his fortune
As a youngster, a hungry Jermaine Pennant burst onto the football scene with Arsenal, signing a £2m contract aged just 15 (pictured)
But he was jailed for three months in 2005 after being found guilty of drink-driving. Pennant is pictured leaving court before being jailed on February 25, 2005.
Birmingham County Court has reportedly issued a one-year bankruptcy order to the former Premier League star, who owes money to creditors including HMRC and the council. He is pictured in London on December 6, 2022
His love life was also rocky, especially with ex-wife Alice Goodwin, with whom he had an on-and-off relationship.
Hollyoaks star Jennifer Metcalf was also one of his girlfriends. She later admits that her dog killed her cat and that she hid it from him by asking him to bury the cat and paying the cleaners to hide the mess.
One lover, glamor model Amy Grove, became furious about his cheating after finding a pair of knickers in her bed. He then locked her out of their £1.1million home, threw £30,000 of her designer clothes out the window and smashed her beloved X-Box.
After 15 clubs in 19 years Mr Pennant’s football career ended without the achievements many had hoped for when he became England’s biggest hope at 16. After retiring he cashed in on the last series of Celebrity Big Brother and media commitments, including an episode where he was accused of being drunk on Sky Sports News.
Earlier this year it emerged that Birmingham County Court had issued a one-year bankruptcy order to the former Premier League star, who owed money to creditors including HMRC, councils, banks and utility companies.
Read Full News Here