Snooping around – in pictures

Wreck of the week: Shropshire. This is a four-bed farmhouse in Madeley, near Telford, in the Ironbridge Gorge world heritage site. You’ll need to renew the kitchen, bathroom and wiring etc, and the rear section is currently used as a potting shed and needs repairing. But it’s large, with original floor tiles and fireplaces, and sits in nearly half an acre. The steep track up to it is shared with shire horses. Cost: £420,000.
Strutt & Parker
Photograph: Carl Blank/Strutt & Parker

In town: Kent. It’s a street away from the seafront at Deal and elegantly refurbished, and is yours for £249,500. Both bedrooms are doubles and there’s potential to convert the cellar with its natural light and original fireplace. Unfortunately there’s no garden, nor parking in the narrow street.
Strutt & Parker
Photograph: Strutt & Parker

In the country: Dorset. It’s a shame this is on a main B-road. Otherwise, it has pastoral views front and back, set as it is in the village of Alton Pancras, near Dorchester, cosy period features, three reception rooms, and three bedrooms, although the third is fairly small. Yours for £395,000.
Knight Frank
Photograph: Knight Frank

Dream home: Cornwall. It’s the views that are the dream, over a cascade of private subtropical gardens to Penzance harbour and Mounts Bay. This £800,000 five-bed Victorian house has been divided into two apartments, so you can fund the vistas from your turret windows by letting out the self-contained top floor. If, however, you want to turn it back into one dwelling the dream becomes a nightmare – the original staircase has been removed and you have to head to the scullery and use the old servants’ stairs to reach the upper floor. The large, huge-windowed rooms retain all their Victorian fancywork and wooden floors, and both halves have a turret room.
Stratton Creber, 01872 240999
Photograph: Stratton Creber