The game of golf may be all about rules — who can join the club, what you can wear, fiendishly complicated scoring systems — but there’s only one golden rule when it comes to property. Build 18 holes of landscaped grass and sandy bunkers, and people and profit will follow.

The British flock to villas and town houses surrounding a well-manicured and well-watered golf course. It has worked in Spain, Cyprus and the Algarve. Now, north of Lisbon, Portugal’s silver coast — so named for its pristine white beaches facing the Atlantic — is looking to golf to turn its real estate gold.

Ten years ago, the Oeste, or western region, 130 miles of beach and jagged cliffs between Lisbon and Figueira da Foz, with its undulating hinterland of windmills, vineyards and cabbage fields, was relatively unknown to British property hunters.

But the new A8 motorway (a byproduct of the Euro 2004 football tournament) has cut journey times from Lisbon to the area in half, opening the colourful market towns of Caldas da Rainha and Turcifal, and pretty fishing villages, such as Peniche.

At the region’s centre is Obidos, a medieval walled town of whitewashed houses, brimming with pink bougainvillea and geraniums, that nestle in the shadow of the castle at its apex. Properties in Obidos rarely come on the market and are snapped up by buyers prepared to pay a considerable premium for the location.

Ten minutes’ drive from Obidos, the Praia D’El Rey Golf and Beach Resort opened its 18-hole links course in 1997. When the first villa plots went on sale they cost £45,000, but have now jumped to £450,000. A five-star Marriott hotel and spa have followed.

According to Charles Roberts, director of sales at Praia D’El Rey, prices in the western region are 25% cheaper than the Algarve, and up to half the price of a comparable property on the Spanish Costas.

Prices at the resort, a 600-acre site bordered by sand dunes and wooded hills, start at £136,000 for a one- or two-bed flat to £255,000 for a three-bed town house with use of a communal pool. But for a villa, expect to pay from £350,000 to £1.5m, depending on the size and specification of the plot.

Launched last month, the final phase of the development, which will total 1,350 homes, includes a new “golf village” and a smaller development closer to the shoreline, where 70% of properties will have views of the Atlantic and the two and a half miles of beach at the resort.

Designed to resemble a traditional hilltop village, with pitched terracotta roofs and whitewashed houses with a splash of bright yellow, royal blue or blancmange pink, the village will include a much-needed supermarket. Owners will pay annual resort service charges of, on average, £1,600.

“About half the buyers are British,” says Roberts. “They don’t even have to like playing golf. In fact, only 25% of people who buy actually play.”

Mike Catt, England rugby star and member of the winning 2003 World Cup team, and his wife, Ali, bought two three-bed town houses overlooking the seventh hole at Praia D’El Rey; one to holiday in, one to let as an investment. Catt, 34, relaxes off the pitch by playing golf.

“Prices have been rising by an average of 20% a year for the past five years,” says Roberts. “Such a rate of growth can’t continue, but the proximity to the shoreline and the sea views should ensure a healthy appreciation.”

Times recommends

• Second homes: credit crunch casualty or money-spinner?
• How I built my own sliding house
• Top 10 incentives for house buyers