In Spain, an entire village was put on the market for less than a house in Australia.
Salto de Castro in Spain’s north-west was listed for €260,000, or about $400,000.
The village in the municipality of Fonfría in Zamora, near the border of Portugal, boasts 44 dwellings, a bar, a church, a hostel and a school with several classrooms. It also has a communal swimming pool.
Salto de Castro in Spain sold for less than a house in Sydney. Credit: Wikimedia Commons.
"Young people used to go there to have drinks and vandalise it,” he told SBS Dateline.
“Before COVID it was valued between five and six million euros, but the owner is 85-years-old and he doesn’t want to work on it.
“He wants to sell it to someone that would continue and finish what he couldn’t finish there.”
'Breathing new life' into abandoned towns
After the advertisement went up online Mr Rodríguez says he received a phone call every five minutes from interested buyers.
The interest came from everywhere, including Russia, New Zealand, the United States, Turkey and India.
“There were business interests as well as personal interests, as part of a life plan,” he said.
He sold Salto de Castro in four days to a Spanish buyer who had the financial support of a firm in Chile.
“They will invest about three million euros to rebuild everything and they will create between 20 and 60 working jobs.”
The sale of villages such as Salto de Castro is part of a new trend, where owners want to “breathe new life” into these abandoned towns. Mr Rodríguez says Royal Invest is speaking with the owners of a few similar towns that are almost ready to go onto the market.
“There are a lot of nice towns in Spain, Italy, France, where people can make a new life, who want to live in a more placid way while also working hard,” he said.
“It’s good for the people and it’s good for the towns.”
He compares this offer to Italy’s One Euro housing plan, where towns sell the dream of living in Italy for a coin, but foreign buyers in exchange need to fix up their old homes with their own money. In turn, the town receives a facelift.
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