At the culmination of a lengthy process of depopulation across Southern Italy, the €1 house program has been an attempt to reverse the population decline.
The South of Italy has been since ages a relatively poor region, with its rural economy of small farming unable to support the families. As a result, there has been a constant flow of emigration. In some cases only a migration to Italy's more prosperous North with more job opportunities. However more often Italians left the country seeking their fortune across the Atlantic or elsewhere in West-Europe.
With the younger population leaving, towns were left with an ageing and declining population. Children were unable to find a buyer for the house of their deceased parents. Houses fell in disrepair and rather than trying to cough up the property taxes for uninhabited houses, properties were ceased to local authorities.
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Most of the 1 euro homes in town centers are located in sloped streets with stairs and steps, impossible to get to by car, impoverished town quarters. The remaining population often resides along the paved acess roads to the town or on flat ground.
Some of the hilltop towns have become unstable through erosion and earthquakes. There are some extreme examples of deserted towns.
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Did these €1 house initiatives bring back life into the towns? Most certainly it has been a boost for the local construction industry involved in the many restauration works. Whereas the towns are embellished, many refurbished homes remain 'vacation houses', sometimes AirBnb or other short term rents. Only few of the owners become permanent residents of their Italian house. Those who do often come to spend their retirement years in Southern Italy. As such the towns keep facing an ageing population; there is only a shift towards a more global distribution of nationalities of the inhabitants.
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Whereas these are the exponents, there is plenty of affordable to cheap real estate in much of Southern Italy.
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Only beachfront estates can be pricier, however still more affordable than in France or even along the favourite Spanish Costa Del Sol, or on the Balearic or Canaries islands.
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