Design your own family home, £355k
FLEXIBILITY is the buzz word at Beechwood Village in Basildon, Essex, a new “greenfield” community of 965 homes where developer Swan Housing is selling 251 customisable houses with up to five bedrooms, priced from £355,000.
Five standard house types are on offer. Buyers then use an online configurator to choose a room layout, external materials and internal finishes. Up to 316,000 permutations are available, with choices from a rear extension or additional bedroom to roof tiles, brick cladding and garden fencing, and from kitchen worktops and bathroom tiles to extra-fluffy carpets. The Avenue house type, for example, can be a two-storey semi with three bedrooms, or extended upwards to become a three-storey four-bedroom house.
With The Terrace type, you can choose a kitchen at the front or rear of the house, opening on to the garden, while The Park style occupies a corner of linked greens. An extra bedroom adds £25,000 to the basic cost and an oriel window is £8,500.
Once a design is confirmed with Swan’s sales consultants, the order is placed and the home is built in a factory, then brought back to be assembled on site. The whole process start to finish typically takes six months. Call 020 3369 0119. Basildon was created in the late Forties as part of the New Town movement aimed at providing affordable homes for bombed-out Londoners. Trains to Fenchurch Street take 31 minutes.
Swan Housing also has projects in Barking and Plaistow and has committed to providing outside space in all its houses and apartments.