This coming fortnight will be a profitable time for strawberry growers and tennis ball manufacturers. On Monday, the Wimbledon Tennis Championships begin, attracting hundreds of thousands of visitors who will consume an estimated two tons of grade one strawberries every day while the players power their way through 50,000 balls.

But the next two weeks could also be lucrative for homeowners fortunate enough to live near the All England Club in south-west London. If they are a little enterprising, prepared to empty a few cupboards and happy to vacate their properties for a couple of weeks, they can command handsome short-term rental incomes for their properties during the course of the tournament.