Has 'dream home for a tenner' contest become a nightmare?

But today Oxford's dream home contest was itself looking in need of hasty repair to rebuild public confidence.

The competition to win 182 Woodstock Road made headlines at home and abroad.

It was advertised as a game of skill, promising far better odds of winning than the lottery or football pools. For to win the £600,000 Edwardian home, all you had to do was send in your reason for wanting it - and a £105 entry fee.

But after failing to attract enough interest from a suspicious public, organisers are having a last go to win over doubters and bring in the cash.

The entry fee has been slashed to £10 for a dream competition that may end up with no winner and may even not take place at all.

Even worse, people have been told not to expect a penny back, even if the competition never happens.

To go ahead, organisers reckon they will need between 65,000 and 70,000 entries - a tenfold increase on the original number needed.

Harry St John, of Oxford property consultant Cluttons, said: "This is quite extraordinary. Odds of 65,000 to one do not look very good.

"It is getting a bit like the lottery. But at least in the lottery you pay your quid and you know that a draw is going to take place. "Wouldn't it be simpler to put the house on the market? The chances are that it would be sold in a fortnight without all this hoo-ha."

Mr St John, Oxfordshire spokesman for the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors, said: "I have been trying to find much more about it but I am afraid I couldn't get any straightforward information at all."

Tom Kavanagh, secretary to the Gaming Board for Great Britain, said: "In theory, this is a skills contest and there is no legislation covering that. If they ran a lottery, they would be in trouble.

"Whether they can run a genuinely skills-based contest and not just pull names out of a hat is another question.

"It would be more of a matter for trading standards, who cover consumer protection."

But the county's trading standards advice service head Debbie Dent said: "Strictly speaking this department would not normally become involved in looking into the structure of a competition where no purchase of goods is involved."

However, she added: "People should not pay money unless they fully understand what they are paying for.

"If they have any queries they should contact the owners."

Meanwhile, the organisers insist the competition is legal. A spokesman for solicitors Field Fisher Waterhouse, the firm which designed the contest, said that it complied with the Lotteries and Amusements Act and also with the British Codes of Advertising and Sales Promotion. He added: "It is a competition of skill whereby the entrants state why they need the house and give the reasons why winning it is so important."

The housewife behind the "dream house for a tenner" idea insists charities will be the ultimate winners.

Grace Trehan and her husband Sandy owned Belmor House for four years.

Under an unusual deal, the house was sold to Swiss company Niedermann SA, with the couple continuing to live in the property.

Mary Ann Read, competition spokesman, said Mrs Trehan organised the competition as an act of gratitude to the company.

She said: "She wanted to sell the house for them. This was a way of selling it quickly while raising money for charity."

But the contest has failed to secure a speedy sale, with the rules being totally changed and the deadline extended by six months.

Organisers said there had been complaints about the original £105 entry charge, which would be refunded to anyone who had paid it already.

Now Mrs Trehan is hoping the new £10 fee will make all the difference. "I am confident that enough people will be keen to invest just £10 in return for a chance of winning a £600,000 house and the charities can't lose." This time the entry fee is non-returnable. If the contest fails to raise well in excess of £600,000 the competition will again be stopped. Only now, say organisers, the money will be donated to charity - after costs have been deducted.

Mrs Trehan remains optimistic about handing over 65,000 written entries to an independent panel of judges. She added: "We are very excited about this."

The new contest rules are:

Entrants now have to send in £10 and explain in 50 to 75 words why they want to win the house.

The £10 entry is non-returnable. The new rules say: "If the contest does not raise enough entries, all the money received will be donated to charity after costs are deducted and no money will be kept by the owners."

At least 65,000 entries are now wanted. The original target was 6,500.

Organisers say that once the £600,000 value of the house has been reached, the rest of the money will go to charity, after costs.

The closing date is now June 30, with the winner announced on July 27. The rules were changed after the original December 30 deadline passed.

Converted for the new archive on 30 June 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.