After falling on hard times and failing to find a buyer for his home, the owner of this six-bedroom manor¹ house in Lancashire, UK, decided² to hold a raffle³, inviting⁴ people to purchase a £2 ticket for the chance to win it. He hopes to sell half a million tickets by August this year.

庄园位于英国的兰开夏郡，内有6间卧室。房间主人在陷入困境、难寻买家之后，决定举办有奖义卖，任何花2英镑（即17元人民币）买票参加活动的人都有可能赢得这座庄园。庄园主人希望在今年八月份之前能卖出50万张票。

37-year-old Dunstan Lowe purchased Melling Manor in 2011 for £435,000, after falling in love with it. He spent a lot of money renovating⁵ it, but soon started struggling with mortgage payments, and was forced to put it up for sale just three years later. The first asking price was £800,000, but no one was interested. Lowe chose to put off selling it until December of last year, when the mansion⁶ was once again offered up, this time for £845,000. Again, there were no takers, so the frustrated⁷ owner dropped the asking price to £650,000, but that didn’t seem to make it more appealing. The house has had just one viewing since, and after looking at his options, Dunstan decided it was time to try a different approach.

37岁的邓斯坦•劳十分喜欢梅林庄园并在2011年的时候花43.5万英镑买下了它。之后他又花大价钱翻新重整，但很快就面临偿还房屋贷款的艰难处境，于是仅过了3年，邓斯坦就别无他法只能将其出售。他最开始的售价是80万英镑，但无人问津。劳决定将其延后到去年12月再出售，要价84.5万英镑，可是依然没有买家。于是，失望的邓斯坦把要价降到65万英镑，然而这个价钱似乎也没有什么吸引力。庄园出售以来只有一个人前来看房，邓斯坦在思考了自己的处境之后，决定是时候尝试一种不同的出售方式了。

After consulting with his wife, Dunstan Lowe made the decision to hold a raffle, offering people the chance to win the house by buying one or multiple £2 tickets online, or sending an envelope or postcard via 1st class post. The winner will be selected on August 1st, 2017, and the owner hopes to sell at least 500,000 tickets until then. That may sound like a lot, but he’s actually off to a good start.

与妻子商量之后，邓斯坦•劳决定举办有奖义卖，参与者只要通过网络或明信片、信件邮递的方式购买一张或多张价值2英镑的票，就有可能赢取庄园。大奖得主将在2017年8月1号揭晓，庄园主人希望在此之前能卖出去至少50万张票。这可能听上去太多了，但邓斯坦的售票活动还真开了个好头。

In February, Lowe told the Evening Standard that he had already sold £120,000 worth of raffle tickets. Within days of setting up a website for the raffle, offers started coming in, and the ample media coverage⁸ he got a couple of months ago in the UK got a lot more people interested in his offer.

2月时，劳告诉《旗帜晚报》说，他已经卖出去了总价值12万英镑的票。开设义卖网站以来，参与者不断增加。几个月前英国媒体对邓斯坦的大量报道也吸引来了很多感兴趣的人。

Dunstan says people from all over the world, including USA and Australia have been buying £2 online, with some of them acquiring several thousand pounds worth of them. He and his family hope to sell enough tickets to cover the cost of the six-bedroom mansion as well as the legal fees and any last minute jobs to ensure the house is as perfect as possible for the next owner.

邓斯坦说在网上花2英镑买票的人来自世界各地，其中有来自美国和澳大利亚的，有些人还会一下买几千英镑的门票。邓斯坦和他的家人希望能通过出售足够多的门票来支付当时买房的钱、相关法律费用以及其他一些后期工作的钱，来保证这座庄园在转手给新主人之前尽可能完美。

“It was really out of frustration⁹. The whole process of viewings and offers, it felt antiquated¹⁰ and frustrating¹¹ so I set up the website and it just took off,” Dunstan said.

“这真的是出于无奈。老掉牙的看房和卖房流程令人失望。于是我建立了一个网站，然后就火了。”邓斯坦说道。

“I had been thinking about doing this on and off for a few years now but so far hadn’t acted,” he added. “I knew that people had done this before but had problems, and I needed to make sure everything was above board and legal.”

“我从开始思考这件事到现在，断断续续的，已经有几年了，但一直都没有付诸实现，”邓斯坦补充道：“我知道之前有人这么操作过而且遇到了很多困难。所以我需要确保所有事情都公开且符合法律要求。”

Melling Manor is still on the market for £650,000, but if it fails to sell by August 1st, 2017, the owner will pick a winner from the raffle participants. If it does sell, Lowe doesn’t plan on giving back the money to everyone. Instead, he plans on offering the whole pot as a cash prize to one lucky winner.

梅林庄园现在的市价仍然是65万英镑，但如果在2017年8月1日之前没能成功售出，庄园的主人就要从义卖参与者中抽选赢家。然而如果庄园在此之前成功售出，劳并不打算归还票款，而是计划把所有票款作为现金大奖提供给一位幸运儿。

Mr. Lowe told the Standard that he would like the house to go to a family that has been struggling to put up a down payment for a house. “That would be my perfect scenario¹². The house has stunning¹³ proportions and scale. It’s fantastic for a family. It’s in the middle of nature, with pheasants running through your garden,” he said.

劳告诉《旗舰晚报》说，他希望这座庄园最后能属于一个付不起房子首付的家庭。“这是我的完美方案。庄园规模很大，对一个家庭来说非常适合。庄园周围自然环境很好，花园里还会有雉鸟经过。”

The Georgian manor house features six bedrooms, a kitchen, cinema room, ballroom¹⁴, new family bathroom and parking for six cars.

这个乔治王时代的庄园有6间卧室，1间厨房，1间电影放映间，1间舞厅，新的家庭浴室和有6个车位的停车处。

To enter the raffle for Melling manor, just head over to WinACountryHouse.com, purchase one or more tickets with PayPal and answer the very simple question “What style of property is this house?”. It’s a multiple answer question, and in case you haven’t been paying attention, the right one is “Georgian”. Good luck!

想要参加梅林庄园义卖的话，请登陆网站WinACountryHouse.com，通过PayPal购买一张或多张门票，并回答一道十分简单的问题——“这座庄园是什么风格的？”。这道题目答案不唯一，但假使你没有注意到的话，正确答案应该是“乔治王时代建筑风格”。祝你好运！