NASA planning to sell or simply ‘hand over’ International Space Station to a private firm

It could be the most generous gift of all time - or one of the priciest purchases in history.

NASA has revealed plans to sell or possibly even give away the International Space Station, which is thought to be the most expensive object ever built.

Bill Hill, NASA’s deputy associate administrator for exploration systems development, : "NASA’s trying to develop economic development in low-earth orbit.

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"Ultimately, our desire is to hand the space station over to either a commercial entity or some other commercial capability so that research can continue in low-earth orbit, we figure that will be in the mid-20s."

The ISS cost more than $150 billion (£115 billion) to build and was funded by a range of countries as well as the European Union.

It was initially expected to remain operational until 2015, but now looks likely to stay in use for much longer.

Many space fans will be hoping it gets bought up by a hotel chain, so it can help create a brand new market for space tourism.

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But seeing as keeping the ISS costs a whopping $5.7million a day, it's unlikely that any ordinary people will be staying the night any time soon.