They don’t know it yet but they are just around the corner from each other

They don’t know it yet but they are just around the corner from each other. In Beaconsfield, Timothy Gerrard, of estate agents Raffety Buckland, is so fed up with the log-jam he has taken matters into his own hands. “If I’d earned a pound for every time someone told me they would sell if only they could find somewhere to buy, I wouldn’t need to sell houses at all”, one estate agent complained the other day He is not alone. But clients not favoured by the phone call can feel aggrieved. “We now refuse to tip anyone off and mail details to everyone at the same time It seems fairer all round”, says Mr Barrington..

Those who have taken to dropping on their estate agent at least weekly expect some rewards. Houses for sale with 10 or 15 acres are few and far between.When they do come up, it is not uncommon to find someone has paid handsomely to take it out of the market A 10 per cent premium may well not be enough. Frustrated purchasers have taken the place of disgruntled vendors these days. Wood has some clients who have been waiting for five years for property with land. So many of the houses we saw were over-developed.”Clearly the longer buyers wait, the harder it is to compromise In Cirencester, Rupert Barrington of John D. Even so, they did not get the 200-year-old house of their dreams “We would still be waiting now, like many couples we know As it is, we have a good size house with great potential. “When we found that our Ealing house had risen in value in a matter of months we thought we would be foolish to wait We were out within eight weeks and renting.

The fact that we did it on the spur of the moment was exciting rather than nerve-wracking.”The Martins narrowed their choice to Northamptonshire – right school, good rail links and reasonable value for money. “There is a danger that their capital will be whittled away if they wait too long.”Christine Martin and her husband decided within a couple of days to sell and go. “Some might go for the right house but in a different area, while others will move into a modern box and wait for more houses to come on to the market. Plenty have been renting for two years longer than they had planned, but often they are stuck because of schools,” says Mr Garne. It seemed worth it to them to pay well over the odds to secure a house.”Most people, even though in the pounds 350,000 to pounds 450,000 bracket, have to compromise. “They arrived in Hampshire, guns blazing,” recalls Tim Garne, of Hamptons International.”Even those with cash found it harder than they imagined.