Recent article in the press (Fractional ownership is the same as part owned)

"We are Mr and Mrs Average," laughs Amanda Brown. "So if we can buy a place abroad using fractional ownership, anyone can do it."

Amanda Brown and her partner Dave Smith, who both work in telecommunications, recently bought a quarter share of an apartment on a new development near Lagos in Portugal.

"Because we both work full-time," says Ms Brown, "we can only take a maximum of six weeks' holiday a year, so it didn't make sense paying for something for the whole year."

They also found it very attractive that the company they bought through took care of everything: "When we looked at buying our own place outright, we were put off by all the hassle with Portugese bureaucracy that we would have had to go through," she say. But when they bought a fractional ownership property, "everything was taken care of.".

In fact, the biggest problem they faced throughout the whole process was finding a UK bank to open a Euro account to transfer the funds for the purchase.

Now the proud owners of an apartment five minutes' walk from the sea, Amanda is already checking out which other fractionally owned apartments she can swap, so they can go ski-ing.

As far as Amanda and her partner are concerned, fractional ownership is great: "I don't know why everyone doesn't do it," she says.