AN 11-year-old boy from Thornbury has shown that entrepreneurial spark and is raising £350 to be able to buy his own laptop.

Jacob Hales will be joining The Castle School in September and wanted to have a laptop to help with his homework at secondary school.

He has been washing cars throughout the neighbourhood at people’s homes since the beginning of the summer holidays and is now very close to hitting his target.

Jacob, who went to Manorbrook Primary School, said: “I wanted to buy a laptop because at secondary school there’s a lot of work and homework that you need to do on the computer.

“I started washing cars with five of my friends helping me but there’s only me and one of my friends still doing it now.”

Jacob has raised well over £200 so far and expects to hit his target of £350 after a few more days of washing cars.

He added: “We charge £5 per car but we were given £15 for one, but it was a really dirty car!”

Jacob’s dad, Stephen, who is 36 and lives on Rosslyn Way in Thornbury, praised his son’s efforts and attitude: “Myself and Helen (Stephen’s wife) are very proud of Jake. He’s gone out day after day to wash cars when most kids his age would just play Xbox all day.”

“He’s got a great attitude he’s kept on going when some of his friends have stopped. Of course he still plays on the Xbox but he does car washing at the same time.

Stephen, who is an internet marketer, added: “When he originally said that he wanted to earn money to buy his own laptop we went through various ideas for what they could do to earn money. Car washing is a good option because they can do it on their own.”

To book an appointment for Jacob to wash your car visit his website www.calljacob.ml