Entrepreneur Alfie Best buys residential park in 'fantastic' Yorkshire setting for £2.4m

Self-made millionaire Mr Best is the founder and CEO of the largest residential park home operator in Europe, Wyldecrest Parks. He has now added The Broadstones Residential Park in Bingley, West Yorkshire to his portfolio. Broadstones, which is Mr Best’s first acquisition in Yorkshire, is a long established residential park which lies south of the villages of Eldwick and Gilstead. The tourist attraction of Shipley Glen is just over a mile away.

Mr Best recently spent £6.2m adding two parks in Cornwall and aims to expand from the firm’s current 97 sites to 108 by December and hit 120 by the end of next year.

Mr Best told The Yorkshire Post that he liked to acquire parks which had an upside to value and the potential for further development.

He said: “This park (Broadstones) fitted exactly with this model. We do have to generate revenue streams for the parks to be able to put money back into them. All of our parks are like this; in a fantastic location which is second to none.”

He said park homes are the solution to Britain’s affordable housing crisis.

He said: "People ask me, ‘How long do they last?’ I tell them it is exactly the same length of time as any home, provided you take care of it and maintain it.”

Mr Best is a major donor to charity and shared his wealth-generating secrets through a book ‘Can Anyone Build a Property Empire – Yes’.

Commenting on his company’s charity work, Mr Best said: “We want to do it in a way that’s genuine. Raising money for charity shouldn’t be a chore.”

Mr Best said he had been raising money for charities which are trying to find a treatment for Alzheimer’s disease, because he had seen how the disease could affect sufferers and their families.

One of his offshoot companies, Wyldecrest Events, is a partnership selling tickets and VIP hospitality packages for major venues and events, with some diverted as incentives and prizes for his park home residents.

This initiative includes a £300,000 VIP box accommodating 24 people at the O2, with discounted tickets or competition prizes for major shows and concerts. Other diversifications under the Wyldecrest umbrella include the Vaaroom Campervan hire company he acquired in 2020, East Thurrock United FC, Barbados VIP Villas, a golf course, and Coventry-based Nomad Campervans, a specialist in VW motorhome conversions.

Mr Best became known to millions of TV viewers when he appeared in the hit TV show Undercover Big Boss, where he was transformed into William Finney, a drainage engineer.

Mr Best plans to branch out into the American market, alongside even greater expansion in the UK. He already has a foothold with a 50 per cent share in 15 US sites, worth £285m. His rivals in the US market are expected to include veteran US business magnate Warren Buffett whose $125bn personal fortune makes him the world’s fifth richest person.

Mr Best said he had been given an opportunity to leave a legacy and was passionate about ensuring that everybody should have a home.

He added: “I’m going to roll this out around the world. The US is the next stop. The Americans and Australians celebrate their entrepreneurs and business people so much more than we do.”

He said; “We need to celebrate our country and our industry.”​​​​​​​​​​​​​​