How well do you know your neighbours? According to a study commissioned by MasterCard earlier this month, 40% of women in the UK know more about Katie Price than they do about the people who live next door. But that could be about to change.

Today, somewhere near you - maybe even in your own road - a Big Lunch is taking place. These nationwide street parties will see about 1m people take part in a shindig to rival the 1977 jubilee celebrations.

Dreamt up by Tim Smit, the Eden Project’s chief executive, and Paul Twivy, a social entrepreneur, The Big Lunch is an initiative that aims to bring neighbours and communities together by stringing up bunting and sharing a plate of sandwiches and a cream tea: “human warming”, they like to call it. More than 7,200 people have been busy setting up Big Lunches across the UK, from Frome, in Somerset, to Findhorn, near Inverness.

Simon Kenton is organising a Big Lunch in Wolvercote, three miles from Oxford, on the green outside the Plough pub. The 37-year-old, whose day job is at the Community Action Group Project in the county, is expecting 300 people to join him this afternoon.

“We flyered more than 1,000 houses,” he says. “We want to create a chancefor people to meet their immediate neighbours, and we also want to mix up the different demographics in the area. It’s all about getting people to shop locally, as well as join groups such as allotment associations.” Planned events include face-painting and composting masterclasses, and there will be stalls selling home-grown food and elder- flower champagne.

Admittedly, not everyone wants to hang out with their neighbours every night: sharing a sausage roll and some local gossip may be enough. After all, there is a reason we British like our hedges and fences, and defend our boundaries ferociously. Still, the Big Lunch can be beneficial in the long term. “It’s a great way to find a reputable plumber, mechanic, painter or decorator,” Kenton says.

Twivy agrees: “When people buy homes these days, they are increasingly interested in the vibrancy of the community and the quality of the neighbourhood, as well as the schools. The recession has forced people to be more thoughtful when buying a home. They want to know about the state of the community and how it handles crime and shares resources.”

The rows of trestle tables lining terraced streets and spilling out onto village greens today are only the latest display of the modern community spirit. Where once joining in was deeply uncool, today community action — including the proliferation of school-run and allotment-sharing schemes — confirms that getting together with one’s neighbours is fashionable again.

The warm, fuzzy feeling you get from joining in is undeniable, but it can also be financially advantageous. Last month, British Gas launched a competition to find the country’s “greenest community”. It is looking for local groups with innovative ideas for saving energy or generating it from renewable sources; a short list of a dozen or so projects will then compete for the chance to win £100,000 in funding (visit britishgas.co.uk/greenstreets). The Big Lottery and heritage lottery funds also reward strong community groups that work together to improve health, education and the environment. For more information, go to biglotteryfund.org.uk or hlf.org.uk .

That’s all well and good, but do these initiatives add any value to your home? David Adams, head of residential sales for Chesterton Humberts, certainly thinks so. “It’s not just pubs and good school catchment areas that are a great selling point,” he says. “If househunters feel they are buying into a flourishing area, they will pay more.”

A close, friendly neighbourhood makes a home much more marketable, says Craig Jordan, associate director of the top-end buying agency Property Vision, who oversees the Oxford area, although he admits it’s hard to put a price on this. “When people come to us looking to move house, especially to the countryside, it’s not just a picturesque setting they look for. It’s knowing that a real, vibrant community exists. Clients always want to know about what’s on offer, the sporting life, if there’s a good local pub. Property is not what a village is about. It’s about the people and a sense of pride in a place.”

The work of volunteer groups who keep streets and parks clean, or care for local wildlife, can also maintain an area’s popularity with buyers. Take Muswell Hill, in north London, beloved of yummy mummies thanks to itsgood schools, health-food shops and boutiques, but also because of its immaculate ancient woodland and parks, kept in shape by organisations such as the Friends of Queen’s Wood.

“These things hugely increase the saleability of a home,” says Nigel Grover, manager of Barnard Marcus, a local estate agency, which has two-bedroom flats without gardens for about £350,000. “The kind of buyers you attract here are far more amenable to paying a bit more for these things, which all promote family life and community spirit.”

Of course neighbourhoods - and neighbours - are not without their trials (see below). The party house that plays music all night; the time-honoured dispute over the boundary and who’ll fix the collapsed fence; even the village fête, or equivalent, which can become a hotbed of simmering resentments, even if it’s only over who has grown the largest marrow.

If you are hoping to sell your home this year, then you could make it more marketable by finding out what is happening on your doorstep and turning your community into a selling point. Even if your nearest Big Lunch doesn’t quite turn out to be a Rio carnival, the odds are that you will at least meet a reliable baby-sitter.

Keep the peace and mend fences

Life on your street can’t always be like an Australian soap — there are times when conflicts with neighbours mean you would rather deck them than pour them a drink. So how can you avoid dispute and live in harmony?

If you’re planning work, notify neighbours in advance and, if necessary, ask their views.

If a neighbour is causing you problems, invite them round for an informal chat. A snotty note at this stage could cause more trouble than it’s worth.

If a cup of tea doesn’t work, write a letter with proposals for resolving the problem. You could suggest bringing in an independent arbitrator to make nonbinding suggestions.

If all else fails, contact your local authority’s noise-abatement team or inform your neighbour that if the problem isn’t resolved within a certain time frame, you will contact your solicitors.

Avoid going to court. If you successfully resolve the dispute, you are not legally bound to declare it to a potential buyer.

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