Episode Information Property Ladder: Aylesbury & Ewell

Date Published:

13/06/2008

In this Property Ladder episode Sarah takes on two sets of developers in Aylesbury and Ewell who are convinced that there's easy money to be had in doing up property, but are they heading for an easy profit or complete disaster?

Victorian Terrace in Aylesbury

Photographer Stuart Randall and his wife Marje, a chef, are taking a massive risk. Convinced they can cash in on a completely run down Victorian terraced house they've given up their careers and mortgaged themselves to the hilt. On the face of it Stuart and Marje should be in good shape because they already have one development behind them, but it didn't go too well, in fact it ended up being repossessed!

The property is a traditional two storey Victorian terraced house. Upstairs there's already a good layout of three double bedrooms and a family bathroom. Stuart and Marje are rightly leaving this floor alone. But it's downstairs where their plans go seriously awry.

Here there's two small utility rooms and a kitchen to the rear and to the front a smallish dining room and lounge. They want to knock through these two front rooms and move the corridor wall further into the lounge, all just to give themselves a wider hallway- one of the craziest things Sarah Beeny's ever heard.

But Stuart & Marje are right about one thing. They do need to make this house stand out from their neighbours. Only not with a massive corridor...

Bungalow in Ewell

In Ewell, Matt and Michelle are also plunging headlong into a double or quits project. They've got ambitious plans to turn this three bedroom bungalow into a two storey, five bedroom house. Michelle is pregnant and everything they own is going into the project so you'd expect this to be a development backed up by months of vigorous research.

Matt and Michelle did next to no research about the area, or the local housing stock and have not yet carried out a full structural survey. They couldn't have their eyes more firmly shut if they tried.

As it stands, the property is a small 3 bedroom bungalow on a smallish plot. Matt and Michelle want to build a large extension for a gigantic kitchen diner that will wrap right around the side of the property.They will then put a second floor into the loft, adding a fourth and fifth bedroom and two bathrooms.This is a massive development for two novices...