You could knock one up yourself in the back garden for a couple of hundred quid, but plonk them on a UK beach - in among the UK's most exclusive beach huts in Mudeford near Bournemouth - and suddenly you have a £170,000 property - snapped up within days.

So what's the attraction?

The hut

In this particular case, the hut in question is rather swanky. It was completely rebuilt recently and now features a fully fitted kitchen, and room for six to sleep. There are double-glazed patio doors, full insulation and a small square of decking. There are also solar panels to power the lighting.

It is, however, still just a wooden shed measuring 5.6 by 3.2 metres - without a toilet!

Is it worth it?

It's an utterly bonkers price to be paying for a shed - no matter where it is. And clearly you could put that cash to use in a whole host of ways - buying anything from a five bedroom townhouse in Newcastle to a one bedroomed house in East London.

If seaside living is what you had in mind, you could stretch to a 2 bedroom flat on the sea front in Weston Super Mare. All of these properties boast all sorts of advantages - like a toilet or the ability to power a TV.

Not unusual

However, in the crazy world of beach huts, this isn't beyond the realms of the relatively normal. Huts on this stretch of sand are relatively hard-to-come-by. Even a bog standard beach hut will fetch around £120,000-£145,000 at the moment if it is in reasonable condition. Demand is so high that they usually sell within days or weeks - and its this demand that pushes prices up.

The estate agent who sold the hut, Denisons estate agents, also have a couple more on the market (including the one pictured for £145,000) and has just sold another for £126,000. This hut, by comparison, is exceptionally well equipped, and has a view of the harbour on one side and the beach on the other - hence the additional cost.

Attractions

If you look on it as an over-priced shed, you can never consider it to be worth anything close to the sum it went for. However, if you look on it as somewhere to spend warm summer nights, right beside a beautiful beach, and walk out onto the sand in the morning, then it may make more sense. The estate agent who sold it says he knows of people who stay in their huts during the summer, commute to work, and return to relax on the beach in the evening.

The media has been full of talk - claiming it as the most expensive beach hut in Britain. However, this title was sealed just before the property crash, when Chalet number 4, on Beach Road, in West Bexington, Dorset, sold for £235,000 in 2006. This had the added advantage that it could be lived in all year round and it had a toilet. It was also sold at auction, where the fact there were five keen bidders in the room pushed the price up to the record level.