This empty town in Italy plans to sell homes for €1.
@Andrew0409 , any insight?
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Wouldn’t you pay so much in taxes, upkeep, restoration, etc. that it would end up being a money pit?
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I think that in current year that town only has two possible outcomes:
a) They keep pushing the 1euro meme, it starts to attract people with enough money to restore it and eventually it gets run by the mafia
b) It attracts a few people but not enough to bring it back to a functional place, and they eventually start dumping “”“refugees”"" there
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I didn’t read this story, but European cities (or villages, usually) have done similar things before, in Spain, Italy, and Greece (and maybe elsewhere, too).
Usually these contracts stipulate that the house must be brought up to local building codes and inhabited by the buyer or his agents within a certain amount of time, usually 2-5 years, or the deed is forfeited. Sometimes the contracts also stipulate the finished product must fit in with its surrounding in various ways, or specific contractors must be used in the remodel, or contractors from a specific locale.
When I see this kind of thing I always feel real leary because as an outside you are at a real disadvantage with respect to knowledge, knowledge of exactly how things work there.
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Like others said, you need to fix it up to building regulations. You can’t do it by yourself as you need permits that only certain people can get to work on these old houses. You usually need to hire locals to do it.
That being said, some people with a good eye on these things and able to work with locals on rebuilding. And they have been able to make money on the making them Airbnb and such.
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It’s a video with subtitles. You can do it if you try. 
I’d rather buy the whole town for 1,000E and put up a fence. Be like living in Escape from NY or something. Make it into a paintball park. So many options.
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I am currently actively researching this topic. In connection with the coronavirus, there were great difficulties for this project. But now I heard that the BBC is making a new series about the renovation of houses for 1 euro, and this means that such houses will receive more new interest.
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researching this topic, because you are writing a thesis for some PhD, or researching it, because you just found a 1 Euro coin on the street and thought, hey, where could I get the biggest bang from my Euro?
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Exactly X10 and Southern Mediterranean local governments often see Johnny Foreigner as cash cow.
I always liked people with a sense of humor) And thinking like an investor is not bad… even if your starting amount is 1 euro… Or do you offer to spend my capital on beer? Never.
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See, I’ve always said that the right motivation attracts the Big fish. As soon as I got on the forum, I immediately attracted the attention of an investor who is ready to buy 26,000 houses. And I haven’t read any books about success yet.
So for my research…
Most of the buying offers are really suitable for either dreamers or people who have no problem investing in the Italian way of life. But as for the city from the BBC series, I found good material on why it can be looked at more closely … It’s wineries, tourism and a population of over 10,000 people …:travelsalemi.com/1-euro-house-salemi/
I must say that this show made a lot of noise! A friend of mine applied to buy a house in Penne (Pescara:Sicily) and says that he has already received a call from the municipality. His offer at the auction is about 2000 euros and he is very hopeful of winning. There is a good article with a list of houses for 1 euro in Sicily.
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When I tell Taiwanese about this and inform them that Taiwan’s remote, already crumbling villages are headed in this direction, they all say “nuh-uh! The owners would never sell!” To which I point out that there are quite a few stories of Italians who moved to the US/Canada and their “family home”, “full of childhood memories”, having fallen out of disrepair, was sold for a thousand USD by the local government. Some of them found out about it when their house appeared on someones YouTube video about the derelict building they just bought. Apparently theres an unpaid taxes problem in Italy — many of the owners of these homes are still around, but they haven’t paid property taxes in decades, so the government tells them they can pay the back taxes or the land doesn’t belong to them. I really find it difficult to believe that places like Kinmen (where many a 古厝 is crumbling dangerously and most of the island is great grandparents + their great grandchildren, with everyone else in Taipei or Kaoshuing) wont be considering this some time very soon…
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I’ve seriously considered this sort of thing, but what puts me off is the thought that maybe the locals look like this:
Does anyone know what the (unwritten) rules for renovation are? For example, are you constrained to using certain contractors for everything, or are you allowed to do stuff yourself? Are there endless nitpicking rules about exactly what materials you have to use and suchlike?
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Given they’re selling you property so that their entire economy doesn’t collapse, I would assume they have requirements about who and what you can use for the renovation.
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It’s a scam. Why would someone sell you properties for 1 euros? If it’s too good to be true it is!
Yes you must use approved contractors, no you may not do the work yourself.
It’s basically a bunch of guys that goes, “that’s a nice flat you got here, it would be a shame if something bad happened to it”.
You’re talking about Italy, which is a pretty corrupt country.
A competent government would not go sell properties for 1 euro, dollar, or whatever the local currency is to try and bring in some rich folk into their ponzi scheme. A competent government would make their country a place someone would want to invest into it, like by having a stable, strong economy, low crime, good social system, strong rule of law, fair competition for all, etc.
They would try to get companies to move in to create jobs to bring people in. With good jobs properties there would automatically become more valuable and people would pay big bucks to move there.
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Yeah, sounds plausible.
It occurred to me that the best way to do this sort of thing would be to get together with a hundred or so likely lads, buy up an entire village, and then operate things the Sicilian way.
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Honestly the best way would be to make sure Italy is not the I in PIIGS.
Make your country a country people want to immigrate into and you won’t need to pull any of this ponzi crap.