A COUPLE who spent months doing up a cottage have impressed the producers of a popular Channel 4 property show.

A film crew from Relocation Relocation Relocation told Stephanie O'Reilly and Gary Grierson that their cottage in Shocklach was 'the best presented and staged property they had done in any of the series'.

The modernised 19th Century cottage was one of the properties visited on Wednesday by a London couple who were filmed as they looked to relocate to a country home close to Chester.

Stephanie said: 'They just phoned up out of the blue and said it's been short-listed out of 38, then short-listed down to 10, and then they phoned at 9am on Wednesday and said 'we'll be round in half an hour'.

'I nearly had a heart attack, I said 'I haven't evenhungthecurtains!'Irushed round and put flowers in the kitchen.'

She added: 'There was a big wow factor from the producers because the front of the house is like a tardis.

'It's deceptive from the front, until you go inside you don't realise how spacious it is.'

The £299,950 house will feature in an hour-long show, a spin-off from Location, Location, Location with presenters Kirstie Allsop and Phil Spencer, to be shown on Channel 4 in January.

Stephanie said: 'It was strange to see the presenters, they were instantly recognisable, but they pretty much kept their distance because they have to be seen to be impartial.

'Gary chatted to Kirstie and was very very friendly, to the point of saying 'hello, how are you', and she was scanning the house.'

The two presenters and five crew members spent three hours filming on Wednesday and said they might be returningtomorrow iftheprospectivebuyers liked the property.

Stephanie said: 'They had walked up the street to see where the primary school was and we were just reversing to turn around and move and they walked by us. The TV crew had asked us not to have any contact, but I wound the window down just to say 'hello'.

'She justwinkedatus andsaid'it'svery nice'. I assume they will make an offer in the next few days if they're interested.'

Stephanie and Gary, who live in Faddiley, bought the house in April last year.

Stephanie said: 'We were driving by onedayandsaw agorgeouscottage,and what a state it was in.

'We were going to retire in it, but out of interest we put it on the market.

'When the estate agents - Cavendish Ikin - got involved, in our heads we had committed ourselves to selling it and then it snowballed and Channel 4 have got involved and suddenly it's the hot property of the locality - for today anyway!'

The couple started work on the erty in February and finished it a couple of weeks ago.

'Considering the amount of work we have done, it's record time,' said Stephanie.

'It was antiquated, as if time had gotten this cottage. It had no drainage. The front cottage is the original, even the floorboards, but we have put an tension on the back.

'We did plastering, the house was taken back to the shell, we put on a new roof, and put wrought iron railings back on the front to take it back to its era.'

She added: 'It took up more time than we originally anticipated but obviously it has been worth it, especially for the TV crew to choose it and for them to make the comments they did.'

'Whenever I watch the programme, I always say to myself they never come to Cheshire. I may be wrong but they seem to be concerned with the south, east and Scotland. So I'm hoping that it will put little Shocklach on the map.'