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Italian here. This is mostly a marketing initiative. If you buy those houses, you need to completely renew them using local companies and with a lot of regulati

Italian here. This is mostly a marketing initiative. If you buy those houses, you need to completely renew them using local companies and with a lot of regulation. You will probably spend 100k doing that. If you buy another house, in the same village, maybe you will pay 5k but you have more freedom in the renewal process and you will end spending less.

bombcar 1y ago
I saw a video on these and that was basically the takeaway - fun if you have money to burn, but anyone who is thinking about it and familiar with the place will do other things instead. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JoSC_I2kwMg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JoSC_I2kwMg
amarant 1y ago
I looked into some of these a few years back, when the initiative was new. I remember one house in particular that I found very interesting, an old monastery, iirc somewhere near Parma? I couldn't afford the renovations needed, but it came with several acres of land and generally seemed like a pretty decent deal! Then there were a bunch of huts in some abandoned Sicilian village that seemed less attractive, if probably cheaper to renovate then the 5 story 14th century monastery.
foobarian 1y ago
Even 5k for a house and some land seems like a pretty decent deal. What are the strings attached? Is there local mob extorting you if you move there?
- bpt3 1y ago
  The catch is that the entire area is in decline and there's little to do for social activities or employment. Declining cities in the US have tried this, and they are not places people generally want to live. This is the same scenario, just in a location that is romanticized by most of the western world instead of Baltimore, MD.
  - f1shy 1y ago
    And also not a good idea to think as a retirement place. Probably no big hospital near. There is a reason why people do bot want to live there.
    - bpt3 1y ago
      Yep, good point. In general, services of all kinds will be lacking and will remain so unless there is a massive demographic change (which is highly unlikely).
      - Ekaros 1y ago
        Only sensible solution would be if you were starting a factory and then building company town on something existing... But even then you probably want something slightly bigger already as scaling to big enough is huge investment.
  - BobaFloutist 1y ago
    You'd think a well placed billionaire (or even a "mere" 10s-100s millionaire) could do something interesting there. Buy up 10-20 vacant houses, renovate them, finance a couple of "fun" local entertainment businesses (idk craft breweries or barcades or minigolf or climbing gyms or escape rooms or whatever would be enough of a draw), fund a local arts/music program, and start a small tech/finance/consulting business in town. How much cash investment does it realistically take to make land appreciate even just enough to make it worth it? And I'm not talking Baltimore, which has a population of 600k and just a lot more baked in problems, I'm talking declining European "villages".
    - sidewndr46 1y ago
      Why, when you can just buy the entire island of Lanai?
      - BobaFloutist 1y ago
        I dunno, just seems like a more interesting, fun project. I dunno, I'm sure it's confirmation/reporting bias, but it feels like all of the very wealthy aren't interested in projects that don't give them some huge amount of control or dominance. Like, middle class people will invest and collaborate in public parks, small businesses, a boat, a shared vacation rental. Musicians and athletes are often invested in giving back and revitalizing their home town, or they'll start lifestyle brands or support or invest in upcoming talent or community space. Sure you have plenty of philanthropy and foundations, but I feel like you never see self-interested personal projects that are interesting or fun these days. It's all boring rule-the-world garbage. The whole tech-city in Sonoma county is a good example, why not take over a town in the Valley or in the Sierras and put in fiber and a subsidized grocery store and try to create a small proof of concept first? But no, it always has to be the biggest shiniest bullshit.
PeterStuer 1y ago
Reminds me of the time I was a local radio DJ. We were inundated with these promotions we had to read for "free" exotic vacations. As you can imagine, the "free" part was completely subsumed in an expensive "package" deal.

bombcar 1y ago

I saw a video on these and that was basically the takeaway - fun if you have money to burn, but anyone who is thinking about it and familiar with the place will do other things instead. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JoSC_I2kwMg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JoSC_I2kwMg

amarant 1y ago

I looked into some of these a few years back, when the initiative was new. I remember one house in particular that I found very interesting, an old monastery, iirc somewhere near Parma? I couldn't afford the renovations needed, but it came with several acres of land and generally seemed like a pretty decent deal! Then there were a bunch of huts in some abandoned Sicilian village that seemed less attractive, if probably cheaper to renovate then the 5 story 14th century monastery.

foobarian 1y ago

Even 5k for a house and some land seems like a pretty decent deal. What are the strings attached? Is there local mob extorting you if you move there?

bpt3 1y ago
The catch is that the entire area is in decline and there's little to do for social activities or employment. Declining cities in the US have tried this, and they are not places people generally want to live. This is the same scenario, just in a location that is romanticized by most of the western world instead of Baltimore, MD.
- f1shy 1y ago
  And also not a good idea to think as a retirement place. Probably no big hospital near. There is a reason why people do bot want to live there.
  - bpt3 1y ago
    Yep, good point. In general, services of all kinds will be lacking and will remain so unless there is a massive demographic change (which is highly unlikely).
    - Ekaros 1y ago
      Only sensible solution would be if you were starting a factory and then building company town on something existing... But even then you probably want something slightly bigger already as scaling to big enough is huge investment.
- BobaFloutist 1y ago
  You'd think a well placed billionaire (or even a "mere" 10s-100s millionaire) could do something interesting there. Buy up 10-20 vacant houses, renovate them, finance a couple of "fun" local entertainment businesses (idk craft breweries or barcades or minigolf or climbing gyms or escape rooms or whatever would be enough of a draw), fund a local arts/music program, and start a small tech/finance/consulting business in town. How much cash investment does it realistically take to make land appreciate even just enough to make it worth it? And I'm not talking Baltimore, which has a population of 600k and just a lot more baked in problems, I'm talking declining European "villages".
  - sidewndr46 1y ago
    Why, when you can just buy the entire island of Lanai?
    - BobaFloutist 1y ago
      I dunno, just seems like a more interesting, fun project. I dunno, I'm sure it's confirmation/reporting bias, but it feels like all of the very wealthy aren't interested in projects that don't give them some huge amount of control or dominance. Like, middle class people will invest and collaborate in public parks, small businesses, a boat, a shared vacation rental. Musicians and athletes are often invested in giving back and revitalizing their home town, or they'll start lifestyle brands or support or invest in upcoming talent or community space. Sure you have plenty of philanthropy and foundations, but I feel like you never see self-interested personal projects that are interesting or fun these days. It's all boring rule-the-world garbage. The whole tech-city in Sonoma county is a good example, why not take over a town in the Valley or in the Sierras and put in fiber and a subsidized grocery store and try to create a small proof of concept first? But no, it always has to be the biggest shiniest bullshit.

PeterStuer 1y ago

Reminds me of the time I was a local radio DJ. We were inundated with these promotions we had to read for "free" exotic vacations. As you can imagine, the "free" part was completely subsumed in an expensive "package" deal.