In the opening episode, Sarah meets Annie from Lincolnshire who, at the age of 27, saw the potential in an unused industrial brownfield site, which she snapped up for just £25,000. Just two years later she's now the proud owner of a house worth over a quarter of a million pounds, where there was once an old reservoir, without owing anything to the banks. With designer Max McMurdo and architect Damion Burrows, Sarah meets 29-year-old Kimberley who's desperate to be free of the monthly burden of ever-increasing London rent. With £25,000 of savings, her ingenious solution is to buy a 100-year-old derelict Dutch barge and transform it into her bijou home on the waterways.

Sarah visit a beautiful lakeside property just outside London, built on land where others were unable to get planning permission. There's also a couple in Surrey have a very clever plan to use the sale of their houseboat to build a mortgage-free floating home, and boost their pension. In the West Midlands, a couple have built a cabin in a relative's garden to be there to help with his Alzheimer's. And a man in Hertfordshire has sold off half of his house, raising £250k for his and his wife's retirement.