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AN ATTRACTIVE front garden can significantly increase the value of your home and add as much as £5,000 to the value of a property, according to research by PlantforLife, a campaign by the Horticultural Trades Association, which aims to help people make the most of their gardens.

Almost 80 per cent of 532 estate agents surveyed said front gardens formed part of their sales pitch, while more than a third agreed the appearance of a front garden was key to clinching an offer. If thinking of selling your house this year, you need to get cracking now.

A good design can make a small space appear much larger, while clever planting can add privacy and security. Even if you have a tiny front garden, there are ways to use the space to create positive first impressions. A few carefullyplanted, strategically-placed window boxes and containers near the front door can brighten up the entrance dramatically.

For summer colour, plant petunias and nicotiana in late May.

These can be replaced with pansies in September to keep the display going through the winter. If you want containers to look good now, choose shrubs such as skimmia, mixed with spring-flowering plants now abundant at garden centres, such as primulas, trailing ivy and a few ready-grown spring bulbs such as narcissi.

If your front garden is primarily for parking the car, use ground cover plants and containers in the non-driveway space to perk up the area. Check out dead spaces in the corners, which may lend themselves to some plantings. Alternatively, try separating the driveway from the rest of the garden with small trees or shrub borders.

If there is soil available, plant lowmaintenance ground cover plants such as creeping juniper or cranesbill geranium to help deter weeds and provide some colour.

If you like the minimalist approach and prefer surfaces covered with gravel or paving, there is enormous scope to design an interesting front garden. A simple paved garden could be enhanced with plantings of rosemary, lavender and thyme.

You don't need planning permission to pave an area if the surface is porous or permeable, but you may need to improve soil drainage by adding bulky organic materials or grit to the soil.

Climbers such as clematis alpina cultivars, hydrangea anomala subsp. petiolaris, variegated ivy cultivars and ceanothus can conceal an unsightly wall or fence.

Simply brightening up your front garden can help sell the property.

It may be time to bring out the paintbrush. If you have a front gate, paint it and make sure it's working. A mix of evergreens and herbaceous perennials should be fairly low maintenance, along with some colour in a small border.

PlantforLife has teamed up with property experts Barnard Marcus to launch First Impressions, a guide offering simple garden designs, flowers, plants and maintenance advice for all types of garden.

It can be picked up from participating Barnard Marcus estate agents or downloaded for free from www.plantforlife.info.

Jobs this week ❃ Replace and replenish mulches around the base of trees, shrubs and climbers.

❃ Move shrubs that have outgrown their space to a new location.

❃ Deadhead spring-flowering bulbs once they are past their best

12:17pm Friday 28th March 2008

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