Many Italian villages sell houses for barely 1 euro, but here it was not a success: “Very complicated”

Authentic Italian houses for barely one euro. A lot of ink has been spilled about it in recent years, but it has not been a success everywhere. This is the case in Patrica, among others, he said CNN fixed.

Many of the houses that were and are being sold for one euro in Italian villages were left behind by people who could not sell them and wanted to try their luck elsewhere. The idea behind it is that the dirt-cheap price attracts new residents and can breathe new life into dead villages.

In many villages, such as Mussomeli in Sicily and Zungoli in the Campania region, it was an absolute success, according to Italian media. But in some places it didn’t work. In Patrica, for example, a village south of Rome with barely 3,000 inhabitants. More than forty properties have been left to deteriorate since the early 1900s.

No permission

Mayor Lucio Fiordaliso read about villages that sold houses for one euro, and tells CNN that he consciously copied that idea. “We first mapped all the abandoned houses and contacted the actual owners to transfer their properties to us. But we were only able to sell two houses for one euro.”

Unlike villages that have become underpopulated due to natural disasters, Patrica’s city council requires permission from the owners to sell their abandoned houses. “We have to get their approval first,” says Fiordaliso. “Only then can we sell them. That makes it all very complicated and even almost impossible.”

Family ties

There were at least ten people who initially responded positively to the mayor’s proposal, but they eventually withdrew. Fiordaliso is convinced that they changed their minds under pressure from family members. In Italy, it is often the case that several family members own parts of a home that they have inherited, and therefore permission is required from each of them. But often their relationships have diluted or they have a different view of the future of the property they co-own.

The two homes that were sold for one euro did not coincidentally belong to two people from the neighborhood. Only they could decide and saw the benefit of the sale.