Italian town is struggling to sell off its empty homes for one euro | Hacker News Reader

Italian town is struggling to sell off its empty homes for one euro

cnn.com

30 pointspriyankanath28 comments

This is not an article about there not being demand for pastoral Italian land.

It’s about “abandoned buildings in old Italian towns” being “split between multiple heirs who own just a section – like a bathroom, balcony, kitchen - and nothing” being able to be “sold without written consent from all heirs.” It’s a call for land reform. Not statement of blight.

In the US, I believe this particular problem is mostly avoided by secured property taxes. If there’s a property with an impenetrable ownership scheme, someone needs to pay the property taxes. And if no one pays, then the government (usually the county) can auction off the lot to recover the taxes. At this point, any residual value from the sale and/or tax debt is subject to plenty of arguments between the county and the previous owners (and some of this even went to the Supreme Court recently IIRC), but the property is now owned by whomever bought it at auction, and no consent by the previous owners is required.

(I don’t know how other encumbrances, e.g. contractor’s liens, are handled.)

There are reasons why locals deserted these places. Dealing with Italian beaurocracy, cliques, and organized crime is a nightmare. Nobody will throw time, money, and health at these piles of rubble. To avoid any temptation, delete from your playlists all American romantic comedies about Americans finding happiness in Italian countryside. Attractive places are already owned by industrial and aristocratic families, for centuries, and they are not for sale cheaply.

Wouldn't go that far. Rural exodus is pretty universal in the West, even in countries that have all these under control.

There has to be some catch or legal hurdle involved?

A catch? You need between 50k and 200k euro for renovation, depending on size, and if you change your mind there is no one to sell it to recoup the cost. There is no local job market either. That leaves retired couples and digital nomads, and neither of them actually wants to live in "middle of nowhere", far from health services or any entertainment. I mean, the core issue in all of those depopulated towns is that everyone left to live in better places ...

However as someone who lived in the area I want to point out that the offer is neither a scam nor a meme.

There are people buying these houses (not in droves), and a few communities achieved repopulation. The 1€ offers are an expression of a larger sentiment of the local gov having genuine interest in you moving there, and a promise that they won't drown you in needless bureaucracy or otherwise push you out. And, if you interested in such a renovation project, it's a genuinely great offer ofc.

Agreed on your points on quality of living though, that is indeed the crux.

Patrica seems like a no brainer for a summer house 60km from Rome. Looking at the pics it seems idyllic.

Do a low effort bare minimum renovation for 50k and share it with some friends or family.

There has to be some really bad catch. Like no road or a 10 000 euro a year sewage fee or whatever. Maybe there is a litteral gatekeeper in the village that wont let you in through the gate if he does not like you.

There should be enough Romans (are people in Rome called that?) to fill up cheap mountain houses.

> 60km from Rome

That's a rough commute with a lot of narrow one lane roads in the mountains, almost no medical infrastructure, and the nearest school is in another city (edit: this is wrong - there is an outpost for the local comprehensive school in Patricia)

A lot of people seem to forget that Italy was for all intents and purposes a developing country until the late 1990s-early 2000s (unless you count Turkey, China, Malaysia, Serbia, Russia, and Thailand today as developed countries), and a lot of small towns and villages in Central and Southern Italy are still underinvested

Based on Google Street View, it looks like the kind of small town you'd see depopulated in interior Guangdong or Central Anatolia.

What are you using as a your definition of developed? There are urban, developed parts in all those countries, as well as rural, undeveloped areas with no/few humans in the United States.

Developmental indicators like HDI, childhood mortality, access to clean water (not a right in Italy until 1996), etc.

If Italy in the 1990s was a developed country, then a lot of countries treated as "developing" today are actually developed, hence why I gave the examples of Turkey, China, Malaysia, Serbia, Russia, and Thailand - countries that are "developing" yet have sustained developmental metrics comparable to Italy in the 1990-2005 time period.

Italy was added to G7 (then G6) in '75!

G7 was created by the then 7 largest Oil importers in the aftermath of the 1973 oil crisis. While it has connotations as a developed countries group, the reality is that Italy's developmental indicators lagged compared to much of Western and Northern Europe until the 2000s.

> There should be enough Romans (are people in Rome called that?)

Yup.

Source: am Roman (not Ancient, working on that, slowly)

> summer house

Seems far too crammed to be a relaxing place. How is this any better than urban Rome?

No local jobs, barely any infrastructure, probably extremely basic utilities, probably not so many ways to socialise, &c.

There is nothing wrong with that per say but you're basically buying a pile of rocks shaped into a house in a small rural village

The house costs a euro. The legal and conveyancing fees of a house purchase are several thousand euros. That's before you start renovating.

Yep, there's a house a couple doors down from my house that they can't sell for less than the value of the land it's sitting on for similar reasons -- renovation costs plus liens for back taxes, various city fines &etc.

It's currently back on the market at $4,900 but I know that the city sending someone out to mow the grass is a $200 or $300 bill (can't remember the exact amount) so I imagine there's multiple $10k on top of the purchase price to even get a title.

Hell, I'd buy it just for the garage but...

You imagine or you confirmed?

You'd buy it just for the garage but don't want to put in the time to sort out logistics of a purchase?

The listing specifically states that there are issues (liens and whatnot) that a potential buyer needs to contact the city about and I know, because I'm lazy, lawn mowing tickets cost a couple hundred bucks but not the exact dollar amount and the city is pretty diligent at enforcing that particular ordinance.

So, yeah, I imagine it's more trouble than it's worth.

Where?

https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/436-2nd-Ave-N-Clinton-IA-...

The article explains that the town has struggled to acquire rights to the properties.

You have to move in.

You have to renovate it.

It will also probably be restrictions on the look, you can't just throw up any old repairs.

Here is a non-profit for the Municipality of Mussomeli with some of the rules and houses on offer -

https://www.case1euro.it/how-it-works/

The real catch is why do you want to live/work in a small town in Italy? Or why do you think you'll make a profit?

These towns didn't pop into existence with 1 euro homes. Would you have moved to these small villages for a extra $10,000 a year wages? They are dying, there no reason to think you'll make your taxes back on property increasing.

Equally the most arbitrary things in life can be amazing, 1 euro homes might be a good catalyst.

I'm considering something like this considering all my work went remote. Have a place to retreat to and work from for half a year and spend the other half travelling?

There is no internet there and also likely interruptions in water service during summer. You'll need a car but it will quickly disintegrate on deteriorated local roads. The reality will kick in quite quickly and painfully.

> for one euro [*]

[*] taxes and fees may apply.

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