Another Italian town gears up to sell dollar homes

If you’re worried that there are no more towns in Italy left selling homes for one euro, or a little over a dollar, don’t be.

One town that’s been low key selling homes for the price of a coffee is about to release another tranche of real estate — and the process is even better for buyers than what you might be used to.

No deposit guarantee is needed as downpayment to secure a dilapidated dwelling. All that’s required is your commitment to restyling it.

Penne, located in Italy’s central region of Abruzzo, midway between the Adriatic coast and the Gran Sasso mountain range, is selling off abandoned homes for the price of an espresso in an attempt to stop depopulation.

Since the program began in 2022, six homes have been sold, mostly to Italians. The next tranche of “a handful” of properties will soon be up for grabs “in the next couple of weeks” according to the mayor — and it looks like there’ll be more to follow.

“There are potentially over 40 empty buildings in town looking for new owners, and they’re all located in the historical center which has been declining since families started emigrating decades ago,” Penne’s mayor Gilberto Petrucci tells CNN Travel.

“Although our total population is roughly 1,200 inhabitants, there are only 1,000 people left living in our gorgeous old district, which risks becoming a ghost town.”

Rehabilitating the abandoned homes
This 1,830 square foot house, built in the early 1900s, was sold for one euro in a previous lot.
This 1,830 square foot house, built in the early 1900s, was sold for one euro in a previous lot. Courtesy Gilberto Petrucci
Born and raised in Penne, Petrucci felt he had to do something to breathe new life into the ancient heart of his hometown before it was too late: “It just hurts me so much to see these houses just lying there abandoned. It’s a like a wound.”

The first three one-euro homes were sold in 2022. The second batch of three went at the end of last year.

The latest tranche is composed of the same kind of houses as those that have been sold before: mostly old, some dating back to medieval times with further improvements made during the Renaissance, says Petrucci, although two recent examples that were sold were both built in the early 1900s. They’re up to three stories and range from around 750-1,300 square feet.

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According to Petrucci most of these old homes once belonged to local farming families who fled in search of a brighter future elsewhere — particularly after World War II, when bombings destroyed a large chunk of the town’s architectural heritage.

There was a further wave of emigration in the 1970s when families left for the US, Belgium and Venezuela, and to nearby larger towns and cities to work in factories.

The historical center of Penne is located in a panoramic position spread across two hills, and is made of a maze of arched stone portals and lavishly decorated monumental fountains.