YouTuber Simon Squibb Bought a Stairwell at an Auction for $32,000

• Entrepreneur Simon Squibb just spent $32,000 buying a stairwell in London.
• The YouTuber was the winning bidder at an auction for the derelict stairwell this week.
• Squibb says he plans to create office space to help people get new businesses up and running.

In a city like London where an “apartment” smaller than a parking space with no bathroom or kitchen was priced at about $220,000, a property with a reserve price of just £20,000 ($25,000) might sound like an absolute bargain.

But before getting too excited you might want to know that said “property” in Twickenham, west London, is a disused staircase that no longer serves the office building it’s attached to.

The listing caught the eye of Simon Squibb, an entrepreneur and YouTuber, who ended up paying £25,000 (about $32,000) to see off two other bidders. He hopes to use the space to help other budding entrepreneurs.

A listing video shared on YouTube shows an austere concrete stairwell surrounded by glass, with the interior littered with fire extinguishers, cardboard boxes, and even a grubby mattress.

Squibb heard about the property on a radio show just two days before Tuesday’s auction and told Insider he had to act quickly to prepare a bid.

He runs HelpBnk, which helps people start their own businesses with free advice. Squibb felt the steps were like how he views his venture.

“People always talk about the elevator pitch, but an elevator’s expensive – and it’s much more fun to be in step by step. It’s the first time in London there’s steps for sale, and it jumped out at me as a good analogy for our first office,” he said.

Squibb plans to set up a HelpBnk office in the stairwell and offer space to budding entrepreneurs to help them get projects up and running.

There are seven landings within the stairwell, each of which Squibb hopes to convert into office space. He gets access to stairwell three weeks after the deal is finalized and then plans to call in contractors.

The listing attracted media attention in the UK as another example of the out-of-control London property market.

“A lot of people can’t do what they love because they’ve got huge rents to pay or huge mortgages to pay,” Squibb said. He told BBC News he became homeless as a teenager.

Squibb says property developers suggested he could convert the stairwell into an apartment and make 10 times what he paid for the stairwell. It was an idea he rejected.

“Property can’t be a business in my opinion, it’s not a real business,” he told Insider. “In real businesses you create something that makes the world a better place, and I’m not sure making the property market even more expensive is what I want.”

But for anyone thinking a large closet or a stairwell is the weirdest thing you can buy on the London property market – think again.

If you have about $63,000 to spare, you could be the proud owner of an “exciting'” 121 sq ft property in fashionable South Kensington that’s “only a 20-minute walk to Harrods.”

So what’s the catch? Well, it’s a third-floor terrace. Glenn Jacobs, the realtor handling the sale, told the Evening Standard the listings’s been “really, really popular,” adding: “I’ve had people approach me about whether the lease would enable them to live in a tent on the terrace.”