Changing homes and channels

Wed, Apr 19th 2006, 11:00

A new Wirral home gets its small screen debut and provides the backdrop for a national property guru to demonstrate how selling a home is really done.

Redrow’s five-bedroom Montgomery home at Badgers Croft in Little Sutton and the co-founder of Home Stagers®, Tina Jesson, have a starring role in BBC One’s programme ‘Downsize Me’ next Friday (April 21) at 11am.

Presented by Jeremy Milnes and Julia Botfield, ‘Downsize Me’ looks at ways in which people can adopt a simpler way of life.

Carla-Maria Lawson, executive producer for BBC Daytime, says: “With a third of British house hunters reported to be trading down the property ladder in order to up their quality of life, Downsize Me taps into this growing desire to simplify overburdened lives.

“The downsizing trend is part of a fundamental shift to reassess our whole attitude to success and status. Practically, it means trying to live better with less – and that’s a challenge we’ll be putting to the test.”

Friday’s programme focuses on a man who is downsizing and moving to Spain. There he wants to set up his own home staging company and Redrow’s Montgomery home was used as the backdrop when Tina was brought in to offer advice on how to get started and the pitfalls to avoid.

Tina’s Home Stagers® team provide expert advice on how to make a property more saleable, mostly through small changes such as lighting, painting, de-cluttering or defining a room’s purpose plus she will show you the right way to guide potential buyers around your home.

Tina is no stranger to the small screen and has worked for ITV’s Tonight with Trevor Macdonald and acted as a consultant to Channel 4’s Property Ladder and Selling Houses.

In the programme Tina sets the challenge of redressing Redrow’s show home master bedroom and reviews the man’s efforts afterwards.

Tina says: “I knew that his own property was very masculine and I was worried that he would try to make the master bedroom too masculine as a result. It’s really important that a master bedroom in a family home is dressed sympathetically for the woman, as it tends to be women who make the buying decision when purchasing a home. If it was a second bedroom or a loft apartment, then you can get away with a more masculine feel.”

Redrow has a close working relationship with Home Stagers® through its Mastermove scheme. Exclusive to Redrow, Mastermove helps people throughout the entire selling process from making their current home look its best for buyers to finding the ideal estate agent – plus they will cover the estate agent fees.

Mastermove is available at Badgers Croft, a well-established Wirral development close to Little Sutton village. The development will eventually feature 96 properties in a wonderfully mature location. Priced from £249,950, four and five-bedroom homes are currently available, including the star of Friday’s ‘Downsize Me’, the Montgomery, priced from £451,950.

For more information on Badgers Croft visit the development between 10am and 5.30pm seven days a week or call 0845 676 0368.