As a young professional working and renting in London, I understand like thousands of others the the near impossibility of getting on the property ladder in London. Renting in London does give me more time to play as opposed to spending valuable leisure time on commuter trains but it also means that the ladder to property ownership is getting higher and higher. So I have thought, like many others, about finding a town within suitable commuting distance of London and trying to buy there. However, a friend of mine, a young women, has set up a competition to win her grade 11 listed Victorian cottage near Cambridge, mortgage free and stamp duty paid for £25 . The picture postcard cottage sits in one of the most sought after villages in the Cambs region and is within 15 to 20 mins of both Cambridge and Huntingdon train stations and is therefore perfect for those who are commuting to London. The win my cottage website address is www.winmycottage.com. I think this would be of great interest to the many people like myself who regularly view the rat and mouse website.

Ever come across these guys?

Best,

Yes I did read about them earlier in the year but I thought it was a pretty uninspiring property in an equally uninspiring location. Never the less, still a great way to own a flat for £2.50. However, my friends property is a whole different ball game and the location is amazing. Its a brilliant opportunity for anyone working in London to live only an hour away by train and own a dream property. As soon as I showed the guys in my office the cottage details they went wild and the general reaction was " Got to have a go at this". The local estate agent said it all when he was quoted as saying "a property like this rarely appears on the market, never mind as a prize!"

Got to be worth a mention on rat and mouse?

I appreciate the email, but I guess my cynicism stems partly from the fact that I'm being offered real live odds of 14,999-1, for a potential payout of 7,485-1 (inc. stamp duty and conv.); and partly because I've reported on two other similar schemes and know that the usual outcome is that not enough tickets are sold, in which case the winner again gets around 50% value (and the organizers the other 50%).

As soon as I showed the guys in my office the cottage details they went wild and the general reaction was "Got to have a go at this".

If your colleagues ever play poker, I hope you'll let me know.

From the other side of the fence, though, I can see the attraction. The cost of a webpage (negligible) and a little legal advice and homemade PR...

I do wish you luck with it, and hope you'll prove me wrong re sales.

Best wishes,

I understand where yor coming from but bear this in mind.

If your talking odds....statistics show that the average lottery player is now spending around £20 per month on the two weekly lottery draws for odds of millions to one. To win the value of the cottage, £185,000, on the lottery takes odds of over 3 million to one. So all of a sudden £25 for odds 15,000 to one does not look that bad and thats if you only buy one ticket. She has had many people buying more than one...up to 8 in fact. You could and probably will spend £25 buying a couple of rounds of drinks down your local...and there are plenty of other ways that you will spend £25 and wonder what the hell you spent it on. You just have to see the wood for the tree's. This type of thing has never been done with a property like this and thats where your missing the point. Not all houses are just houses..some are beautiful cottages that most people would yearn to own....the key to the property market has always been the same...location,location,location and if its a picture postcard property to boot...then it sets it apart from the others. You could be one the first people to report on a successful house raffle but you will never know if you just dismiss it as "just another one".

Vist the website and see for yourself.

Thanks.

I agree, the lottery's a helpful comparison. And I would never suggest a first-time buyer treats that as a sensible way of trying to get onto the property ladder, either.

My point was theoretical really - that a ticket that costs £25 is worth more like £14. If a player bought every single ticket, he'd lose, and by a margin (almost 50%) that some people might consider unreasonable. Isn't that seeing the wood from the trees?

The house looks very nice, though. How many tickets have been sold so far?

How about we come to a compromise - you get your plug and I publish the correspondence below (including your latest response if you wish)? Of course, I'll remove your name and email address....

What do you say? Leave it to the readers?

You cant really compare the cottage competition to a traditional type 'lottery' since the outcome is not dependant on a set of multiple numbers being drawn. There will only be one number drawn to determine the winner and that number will come from a total pool of numbers that is capped. Since there is a maximum amount of entries available the competition has to be compared to a raffle. And therefore if a person bought all the tickets they would indeed win the cottage but their immediate winnings would be less than their outlay, yes. However, in real life its possible you could spend the same amount of money and not guarentee that you will find a property like this in this location...at least if you bought all the tickets you could. But lets get back to planet earth.....no-one is going to buy every ticket after all.

This competition is not really about odds necessarily, its about spending an amount of money that you would consider disposable, in this case £25, on an equal chance of winning a prize that, lets face it, will change your life. £25 that you will most definately blow down your local, its not even half a tank of petrol or less than five packs of fags, a meal for one, probably 80% of a ticket to see a premiership football match or theatre ticket. And that is what it really comes down to. You can do what you have done in earlier correspondence and sit and analyze the mathematics or you can stop being so cynical and say "its just £25 for gods sake....rather than line the pockets of my local brewery, ill have a go at changing my life by giving myself as much chance as anyone else of winning this amazing prize". We are not talking lottery odds here....you really do have a chance.

Yes please publish it as you wish but dont forget to give your readers the website address.