ESTATE agents Poulters are in tune with the property market to such a pitch that they are selling a house complete with a grand piano.

The piano has been part of a modern house in Darlington Road, Basingstoke, since 1970, when its owner Alan Miller moved to the town.

Mr Miller came here to work for the Civil Service Commission in the old concrete building opposite Basingstoke railway station, which has since been razed to the ground and replaced with the new Crown Heights apartments.

And while Mr Miller, 78, is moving, the piano will stay as part of the £379,000 asking price. Mr Miller estimates the value of the John Broadbent & Sons piano, which was built in 1898, to be about £2,000.

He said: "I am moving to Bristol, where my two daughters and grandchildren live. I have to move to a much smaller house and would not have a large enough room for the piano.

"It is a very beautiful piece of furniture and I would like to sell the house and piano to a musical family."

Mr Miller is a bass singer with a special talent for Elizabethan madrigals and church music, and has even sung in St Paul's Cathedral.

At one time he ran the Lindsey Choir in Basingstoke and used the piano - which stands on a wood block floor in an open-plan reception hall and music room - for rehearsals.

The house, which was built in about 1970, has been given a double-storey extension, increasing its original four bedrooms to six.

The sitting room and kitchen-family room - with an arch into the utility area - both have patio doors out to the garden, which has a seating area beside a raised fishpond.

As well as six bedrooms, the upstairs accommodation includes an en suite shower room, family bathroom and a study.

In fact, given its musical connection, the huge house has enough room to sleep a new generation of the von Trapp family singers from The Sound of Music!