FOR… A SUNNY ESCAPE

Sandown, Isle of Wight

Folk can be a bit snooty about the Isle of Wight’s popular south-coast resort: caught in a time warp, it doesn’t have the cache of sailing hotspots like Cowes or Seaview on the Solent side of the island. Those who like a bucket-and-spade retro vibe, however, might make a beeline for Sandown. The sunny south-coast town (the sunniest in the UK, by all accounts) is all golden sands, palm trees, fossils and sub-tropical gardens – and it’s cheaper than neighbouring Ventnor (where prices went a bit crazy when the down-from-London crowd starting heading this way). There are a lot of pensioners in Sandown; ditto coach parties, but the beach is a peach, the town is joined at the hip with pretty Shanklin Village, there’s a zoo, a dinosaur museum and a local stop on the Island Line which travels to Ryde in a repurposed London Underground tube train. £300,000 buys a four-bed 1930s semi or a swish, new sea-front apartment on Culver Parade.

• Average house price: £249,959