For the average homeowner or buyer the outlook on house prices has been towards short-term gain but as prices stabilise the view should be more towards longer-term strategies to make the most of our investment.

Richard Donnell from FPDSavills Residential Research says that occupiers and investors face a growing challenge over how to out-perform the market. There are a number of long-term pressures on the market that will create real opportunities for those who start to think ahead.

It’s generally accepted that we are moving to an era of much slower growth in average prices, where values track household incomes. Donnell says would-be buyers will need to reconsider their strategies for making significant money out of the market in future.

The simplest way of achieving this will be by examining the potential to add value through home improvements. Many owners have already been very busy doing this. Record levels of mortgage equity withdrawal are fuelling increased spending on home improvements.

The key to adding value comes in expanding actual space rather than mere cosmetic makeovers. As such, loft conversions, digging out cellars, building extensions and developing garden plots are the real value adding winners.

Small-scale DIY continues to be an area where the average homeowner spends money. Decorating, according to a recent survey by Alliance and Leicester, is still the number one spend item in a year when record spending on DIY is predicted.

But small-scale spending does not bring long-term gain. It is chilling to find the same survey shows that only 2% will spend on putting up a conservatory. Moreover, the 2% figure has been static for more than two years.

Only 7% are planning a new kitchen, only 6% a bathroom both areas where money spent may get added to the value of the house.

Donnell and others have pointed out that less than a fifth of equity withdrawn from housing is spent on major home improvements. Much of what is spent goes into updating the internal fabric of the dwelling, on cosmetic improvements and general decoration. It is astounding how much money we, as a nation, are currently spending on maintaining our old and ageing housing stock.

Mind you – with house building not being able to keep up with demand for at least another 15 years and probably very much longer – we need to keep on maintaining our homes. Recent research by Halifax shows that if the current level of house-building is not increased in London and the South East, there will be cumulative shortage of around half a million dwellings in these two regions alone by 2021. Donnell thinks the current, low levels of house building means that the average house will have to last around a thousand years before it is replaced.

Donnell says that recent research on DIY spending shows the average annual spend appears to be around £6,400 a year. This is probably high, compared to the historic long-term average, and fuelled by mortgage equity withdrawal. Nevertheless, over the 50 years of owning a property, the average household could end up spending over £300,000 on modernising and repairing their home. This is double the average price of a house in the UK. Whilst it is a major additional cost of home ownership, it is also a huge, hidden, support for house prices.

In future years, FPDSavills expect households to become increasingly aware of the costs of maintaining a home. It is not something we can avoid. Over the years there is a lot of on-going repair and maintenance work to be done to the structural fabric of Britain’s housing stock.

Donnell points out that whilst jobbing builders will be rubbing their hands with glee, the housing types that will cost the most to maintain will see values under-perform the market over the long term.

The rising cost of constantly rebuilding homes is part of the continued polarisation of the housing market, between the most desirable and least desirable housing types and locations.

The prime (typically period housing) and new build sectors are likely to fare best, says Donnell. Our aspirations to live in the best housing will support the scrabble to get onto the most desirable rungs of the ladder and provide a steady upward push on values in these two market segments.

Changing patterns of demand and economic factors have already taken their toll on some housing markets in the northern regions of England.

The markets, and house prices, in the South are likely to be underpinned by our inability to build enough homes. Although large tracts of suburbia in southern towns and cities are generally poorly served by public transport, the sheer imbalance between supply and demand will add support to values.

However, in some cases, where there are very low density housing types, such as 1930's bungalows or post war semi’s, the land the housing stands on could start to be worth more than the house itself.

This will eventually be spotted by investors and developers who will start to exploit the potential to add value to housing plots rather than the bricks and mortar that stand on each plot.

DIY maintenance will clearly trundle on in many areas. Indeed, as more people own their own property this will be the major way that investment is protected.

Some longer-term conscious people will add space to their properties producing a real increase in value of their investment.

But the really long-term investor will be looking to buy property for it’s long-term value in terms of land resource. The current partiality of developers to build on virgin land will soon turn into cost-effective experience in making money turn on brownfield sites opening another chapter in the property market.