This Italian village is selling houses for €1 and we're so there

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If you’ve been planning your post-lockdown getaway and dreaming of staying in the Italian villa from Normal People, guess what? You can now enjoy endless pizza and pasta and prosecco whilst soaking up the rays in your very on Italian home for just €1.

Yes, really. That’s around 90p – cheaper than an ice cream.

So it’s time to get on Pinterest for renovation inspiration, because the one catch is that you have to pull out your revamping wand to get your hands on a property.

The town of Cinquefrondi, in the southern region of Calabria, is looking for new residents, and with no reported cases of coronavirus they’re also attracting interest by promoting their ‘Covid-free’ village.

Mayor of Cinquefrondi, Michele Conia, told CNN that while many young people are leaving in search of work, they’re hoping to populate the village once more by offering homes for an astonishingly low price, with the initiative known as ‘Operation Beauty’.

‘Finding new owners for the many abandoned houses we have is a key part of the Operation Beauty that I have launched to recover degraded, lost parts of town,’ he said.

‘I grew up in Germany where my parents had migrated, then I came back to save my land. Too many people have fled from here over the decades, leaving behind empty houses. We can’t succumb to resignation.’

It’s surrounded by the rugged Aspromonte National Park and also overlooks the Ionian and Tyrrhenian coasts. Sounds like the dream.

Conia continued: ‘We rise between the refreshing hills and two warm seas, a pristine river runs nearby and the beaches are just 15 minutes away by car. But a whole district of my town lies abandoned, with empty houses that are also unstable and risky.’

All you need to do is pay an annual €250 policy insurance fee until the house is renovated, and you’ve got three years to complete the makeover (or risk a €20,000 fine).

An Italian home for less than a flat white? We’re sold.

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