Following on from Joss’s post below about studio houses, here’s a random fact for you: Dante Gabriel Rossetti wasn’t just an artistic pioneer; he was also one of the first men in England to die in a bungalow.

This, admittedly, was because he was also one of the first people in England to live in a bungalow – but even so.

Said bungalow was out in Birchington-on-Sea in Kent where in the 1880s the Arts & Crafts architect John Seedon built an up-market single-storied estate – the very first of its kind in England.

Rail travel had brought the seaside within reach of the masses, so the Tower Bungalow Estate was carefully pitched – and priced – as a well-bred retreat untainted by cheap working class amusements.

In 1881, a sniffy Athol Mayhew wrote:

“Here there are no German bands in the gardens, no distressing minstrels on the sands, no revolting donkey drivers on the roads.  Birchington offers absolutely nothing, not even a solitary tea garden.”

An ailing Rossetti fetched up here in 1882 but even the absence of minstrels and donkey drivers couldn’t save him. He died a few weeks later and is buried in Birchington-on-Sea cemetery.

According to Wikipedia, admirers still come and leave flowers on his grave. The bungalow he died in was demolished in the 60s but some of the tower bungalows still stand and come up for sale from time to time.

Pics:  thanks to Birchington Heritage Trust for use of pictures.

For more on bungalows, see Buyer’s Guide: Bungalows and The Truth About … Bungalows.

In honour of the BBC’s lavish new series, Desperate Romantics, which is based on the lives of the artists behind the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood (William Holman Hunt, John Everett Millais and Dante Gabriel Rossetti), this week’s Five to View focuses on studio houses.

The Pre-Raphaelite boys and their associates were often from privileged backgrounds, of course, so there was no need for roughing it in garrets or any of that “starving artist” nonsense.

Rather, they inhabited wonderful, light-filled houses or specially designed studio spaces, often in upmarket areas like Chelsea. Studio houses were a kind of 19th century live/work space, if you will.

These days they’re seriously sought-after and very expensive, but there’s no harm in looking!

So here’s our gallery of five studio houses currently on the market:

(Click on pictures for full property details)

1. Glebe Place  SW3

2. St Pauls Studios W14

3. Dovehouse Street SW3

4. The Vale SW3

5. Scarsdale Studios W8

For more, read our guide to Studio Houses.

If you took one dollop of 2001: A Space Odyssey, whisked in a hefty glug of Blade Runner and added a dash of The Mummy you’d end up with something like Makoto Tanijiri’s sleekly beautiful Pyramid house in Saijo, Hiroshima, Japan.

photo © Toshiyuki Yano (Nacasa&Partners Inc.)

Not only is it a stunningly futuristic statement, but it also apparently echoes the earliest form of Japanese architecture: the pit dwelling, or “tateana jukyo“; where a pit was dug out and then covered by a thatched roof.

This modern version of the traditional form was completed in 2007, but I’ve only just come across it (via here) and I like it. A lot.

A full article on the whys, hows and whos can be found over at yatzer.com

And if that’s whetted your appetite for living in a conic solid with a polygonal base, then check out the contemporary pyramids blog for more pointy buildings.

We have an interesting graph this week from our research team showing the relationship between falling stock levels and rising prices.

According to our figures, stock levels in the sales market are down 21.7 since their peak in February and have fallen month-on-month since then.

Significantly, house prices stabilized in April and have been on the rise as supply has dwindled.

Andrew Smith, FindaProperty.com’s Head of Research, says:

“Regionally, there are some interesting trends. In London, for example,  the average asking price has risen to £427,886 which is 3.2 per cent higher than June and 5.7 per cent higher than a year ago.

“This increase in asking prices corresponds with falling supply – in fact supply in London is 35 per cent lower than the levels seen a year ago.  The South East, the South West and the North East have also recorded at least three consecutive months of rising sales prices and falling supply.

“On the other hand, regions such as Scotland are still struggling, with an increase in supply and prices still falling both month-on-month and year-on-year.”

It’s hardly surprising, then, that agents in some areas are reporting the return of gazumping and sealed bids for the best properties: after a long period of relentless price cuts, the balance is tipping back towards sellers.

It remains to be seen how long this state of affairs will last – but if I was a homeowner thinking about selling, I’d be getting an agent in to value my place as soon as possible to make the most of the current  intense competition for limited stock.

Need a valuation? Search for a local estate agent on FindaProperty.com.

Ever had problems finding a gift for the garage owner who has everything?  Yep, me too.  It’s an all-too-common problem these days.

But not any more! An enterprising German company has come up with the perfect solution: photo tarpaulins in handy garage-sized dimensions.

Take your pick from a staggering array of designs.  Yacht; racing car; jet plane; vintage motor; wine cellar; kids.

Hold on: kids? Whaaat??! ! Apparently you can order a customised garage door by sending in photos of your family or pets. Which will then be super-sized. Hmmm … not so sure about that!

Then again … perhaps I’ve stumbled across the true purpose of this inspired product: home security.

Freakishly large puppies and colossal kittens? Babies of Amazonian proportions? Good lord, there’s not a burglar in the land would come anywhere near…

Welcome to our new series where we’ll be focusing on a different property type each week – a bit of a 57 varieties of the residential world, if you like.

To start: thatched cottages - simply because they appeal to my retirement fantasy of living a Miss Marple-esque existence where I effortlessly solve local village crimes from behind net curtains.

And so, without further ado, we present our top five thatched specimens, direct from FindaProperty.com’s current listings:

(Click on pictures for full property details)

1. Chippenham, Wiltshire

2. North Cotes, Lincolnshire

3. Wallingford, Oxfordshire

4. Climping, West Sussex

5. Hungerford, Berkshire

Anyone see Property Snakes & Ladders the other night? Quite an interesting show about the conversion of an old railway station.

This put me in mind of a couple of very cool homes I’ve come across recently – both made from old railway carriages.

First up is this one in Dorset – which looks a bit like the 9:15 to Weymouth has crashed into the side of a timber-framed chalet (actually two beach huts).

But fear not, there’s been no rolling stock/beach hut catastrophe here – the crafty owner, none other than Paul Atterbury off the Antiques Roadshow (anyone under 30 – ask yer granddad), installed the carriage to let out.

And he makes, it says here, “an excellent income” from the arrangement. Go Pauly!

(Click on pictures for full property details)

The second one is playing serious havoc with my hankerings to clear off and live a life of rustic simplicity by the sea … I’m not sure I’ll be able to do any work at all today after looking at this (but hey, that’s why they invented meetings)

It’s a 1920s railway carriage converted into a quaint little cliff-side home. And if you’re thinking that £375,000 is a tad pricey for a converted train carriage, look again.

The real draw here is the surrounding ten acres of waterfalls and ferns, orchards and mixed woodland, fields and wild heather, all of it leading down to Kennack Sands Beach.

There isn’t a lot more I can say about this … too busy drooling.

Ps: anyone know if you can make a living farming ferns?

Related stories

The Truth About Station Conversions

All Aboard For The New Live/Work Spaces

Our technical chaps are always busy trying to come up with clever new features that make life easier for our users.

So when Barry from the ‘Build Cool New Stuff’ team was seen running naked around the car park roaring “Eureka!” we knew that either A) they’d come up with something quite good or B) old Baz has been working too hard and needs a very long holiday.

Fortunately, in this case it was A.

The feature in question allows you to find out how much a property has been reduced by - so as you browse the property listings keep an eye out for the new Reduced From flag. It’s yellow and looks like this:

Click pic for example

Properties with this flag include the current price and below it you can see the price it was originally advertised at – which, I think you’ll agree, is very helpful if you’re planning to make an offer.

To activate this feature, all you have to do is sign up at Register with FindaProperty.com. When you register you have the added advantage of receiving email updates with new properties matching your requirements.

If you have any suggestions for other features we could add to make your property hunt easier please send them to:

PleaseBuildMoreCoolNewStuff@findaproperty.com.

Here’s an interesting graph from Nationwide’s latest house price index (June) showing the decline in the amount of property currently on the market.

It’s using data from the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors and it doesn’t need a huge amount of explanation: basically, since the credit crunch, stock levels in the sales market have plummeted.

In RICS’ own words: “New instructions to sell property fell further in May. This series has now dropped in every single month over the last two years and, if anything, the picture appears to be becoming more acute.”

The Nationwide notes that the recent recovery in house prices has occurred despite historically low levels of house purchase and they conclude that low stock levels explain this anomaly.

“Normally, such a low level of house purchases would be associated with falling house prices … however, there continues to be a relentless drop in the stock of property available for sale. As a result, prices have been able to stabilise even in the face of very low demand.”

Fair enough, but will stock levels rise, and what will happen if they do? One possible scenario is that the more stable sales market will encourage people to put their homes on the market. Job losses, alas, will also force more people to sell.

But will demand rise to meet increasing stock levels? Our own figures suggest demand is already strong – in June, visitors to FindaProperty.com were up 12.6 per cent year-on-year and enquiries to agents were up 15.6 per cent.

But as we all know, interest is still not translating into significantly more sales. Unless it starts to, a rise in stock levels could tip the balance again and put the pressure back on prices.

This is why the NAEA today called on the Government to “do more to ensure that money that has been given to banks finds its way through the system and into the housing market.”  We second that … but will the call be heard?

In the meantime, the upside of this situation is that low stock levels mean sellers are in as good a position as they’ve been in months - lots of interest and little competition. So if you’re thinking about selling, this could well be the moment to go for it.

The winner of Shed of the Year 2009 has been announced over at The Shed Blog, and wooah! What a wonder!

In fact, it’s such a humdinger of a shed that Steven Harwood’s Kite Cabin has caused some heated debate in the Editorial Dept here at FAP Towers.

“It’s bigger than my bloody flat,” spluttered Mike one indignant employee who shall remain nameless.

This was swiftly followed by “that’s not a shed” and “it’s got a bloody great big satellite dish!”

Similar outraged mutterings continued for a while and, whilst we did not reach a concord over whether or not a wooden structure with satellite TV, bunk beds, a composting toilet, and other mod cons is indeed a shed in the truest sense, we did agree that it’s a lovely thing.

Moreover, its situation, which seems to be overlooking a valley behind Harwood’s house in Llandysul, is stunning.

Nice one Steven, enjoy the cheese.