Rocketing prices and the popularity of the Suffolk coast have seen a beach hut put on the market for an astonishing £120,000 – more than the cost of many houses.

Experts think the price tag for the pretty blue-and-white coloured wooden hut on South Green, Southwold, is the highest price yet for a seaside chalet on the east coast.

Last night the price was described as “incredible” and “shocking” with so many young people and families being priced out of the housing market and the coastal area suffering an affordable homes crisis.

Durrants, Southwold, who are handling the sale of the hut called The Vital Spark on the front below the resort’s famous lighthouse, said offers had to be made by 12noon on August 21.

It is positioned on the upper part of the promenade and with direct sea views, next to a water standpipe and not far from cafés along the prom. The estate agents describe it as a “jaunty blue and white painted beach hut”.

They add: “The hut, which is to be sold with most of its contents, has a fold-away table and useful curtained changing area.’’

Priced at £120,000, it still has a long way to go before it matches the highest in the UK – £230,000 for a hut on the exclusive Sandbanks peninsula in Dorset.

Elsewhere in the coastal area, Durrants, Halesworth, have a two-bed period cottage in Darsham up for sale for £115,000, while in Saxmundham, Abbotts are marketing a two-bed town centre flat in Station Approach for the same price.

Also on the market for £115,000 in Westward Ho, Leiston, with William H Brown, is a two-bed terraced property.

Framlingham area Suffolk Coastal councillor Christopher Hudson said he was shocked at the £120,000 price of a beach hut. He said: “It’s incredible.

“I think it epitomises the problems we face over affordable homes in a nutshell.

“Today I was in Ipswich looking at a one-bed starter home for £115,000.

“It’s just the sort of property to get someone on the housing ladder but they will be putting themselves in hock for a lifetime with a mortgage but cannot afford to buy a shed in Southwold.

“It’s very shocking and places like Southwold and Aldeburgh are empty for the winter with all these homes standing unused.”

Earlier this year, Mr Hudson claimed communities in east Suffolk were being “ethnically cleansed” because affordable housing was in such short supply and the cost of other homes was far beyond ordinary people.

At the time, Aldeburgh had been revealed as the third best-performing coastal town for house prices in Britain last year with average property prices of £413,393, while average prices in Framlingham were £261,100 and in Woodbridge £245,000.