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CNN
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Of the many depopulated Italian towns to launch bargain home schemes in recent years, none have been more successful than Sicily’s Sambuca di Sicilia.
Sambuca’s home sell-offs have seen huge demand, with American buyers rushing to snap up discounted houses in the hillside town for a symbolic €1 in 2019 and €2 in 2021.
Previously largely unknown, even to some Italians, Sambuca has since welcomed so many Americans that it’s been nicknamed “Italy’s Little America.”
But according to the town’s mayor Giuseppe Cacioppo, this US buyer trend has changed or, at the very least, slowed down. Now it’s Italians who are snapping up the town’s abandoned homes.
“Something weird happened with this third batch of auctioned homes; we thought more Americans would apply, so we were amazed that for the first time ever it was mainly Italians from all over Italy,” Cacioppo tells CNN.
Sambuca has placed dozens of dwellings on the market over the years in a bid to revive the community, which has suffered from depopulation as residents move to bigger cities.
In both past editions, the number of requests, mostly from the US, to purchase neglected homes was so high that local authorities had to place the old abandoned properties at auction.
While some bidders opted to snap up abandoned ruins, over a hundred Americans purchased ready-to-occupy homes from locals, revitalizing the area’s dwindling real estate market.
So when the town auctioned a new batch of dilapidated homes for a symbolic €3 in November, Cacioppo expected to be flooded by hundreds of bids from US buyers once again. But he was in for a surprise.
Only 15 bidders took part in the auction this time, and just six of these were successful, offering between €500 (about $513) and €12,500 ($12,837).
And for the first time ever, Italians were the largest chunk of bidders who succeeded in buying one of the houses. Aside from one American buyer, the rest were from other European countries, including three Italians.
Cacioppo downplays the lower number of US bidders, arguing that Americans are still flocking to the town to search for houses, but at market value.
“Americans kickstarted the resurrection of Sambuca,” he says. “They bought 18 crumbly homes at auction in the first two rounds, and over 100 turn-key properties privately.
“Now they’re upping the game, seeking homes that may cost more but don’t need a restyle, and are often also furbished.”
Sambuca made global headlines back in 2019, when CNN broke the news of the first round of one-euro homes up for sale, triggering a property stampede made up of mainly American buyers.
Mayor Cacioppo believes that it’s thanks to the interest from US buyers that Italians have finally realized what a good deal the bargain homes can be, and are starting to participate too.
“The Italian buyers are all young and this too is a major surprise. They’re not pensioners but people who can also work remotely,” says the mayor.
“They have come to finally appreciate the beauty and attractiveness of Sicily, with all its plus points.”
Financial adviser Paolo Morabito, 25, from Messina in northeast Sicily, and his architect friend Bruno Surfaro, 28, from Southern Italy’s Calabria region, are among them.
The pair, who bid their lucky numbers — €2,222 (around $2,281) — are now the owners of a tiny, 35-square-meter stone dwelling with a panoramic terrace.
They plan to spend some €30,000 (about $30,810) transforming the property into a vacation retreat and rental.
The rules of the scheme stipulate that buyers must have completed the renovation work on their homes within three years, or risk losing their deposit guarantee.
Morabito, who is a fan of old towns, says he had never been to Sambuca until learning of its recent popularity.
“Even though I’m Sicilian and I live just a few kilometers away, I felt embarrassed at never having even visited the place,” he says.
“So when I did, I thought, ‘Why leave such opportunities to foreigners?’ We Italians, often too lazy, must wake up and buy these properties as well.
“We’ve been blind so far to places like Sambuca, full of derelict empty homes. We have these towns all in our backyard.”
Cristian Salucci, 47, an Italian bidder from the northern city of Ravenna in the Emilia-Romagna region, spent €1,000 (around $1,027) on a 70-square-meter house, which he plans to spend some €100,000 ($102,700) restyling.
“I saw an opportunity for investment, and a close retreat for family vacations with my wife and son,” he says.
According to Salucci, his job as a construction projects manager across Italy helped him realize that Sambuca’s housing scheme has a lot to offer in terms of revitalization of rural towns.
“I don’t think Italians realize the potentials of buying and giving a new life to one-euro homes.”
Paul Kanitra, a 45-year-old civil servant from New Jersey, was the only US buyer in the third auction.
Kanitra’s great-great-grandparents emigrated from Sambuca di Sicilia in the late 1800s for New Jersey in search of a brighter future, leaving behind their family home in the town’s old district.
He bought a badly damaged property in an attempt to reconnect with his Italian roots and now faces a tough renovation.
“The three-euro program has given my wife and I the opportunity to now go back in time and re-establish a little presence in the town of my ancestors,” says Kanitra, who prefers not to disclose how much he bid for the house.
“All of my relatives will share in the small project and are incredibly excited.”
Although the roof at the front of the property is partially caved in, the quarry for Sambuca stone is just outside the town and construction costs are very low, says Kanitra, who was surprised to learn that he was the only US buyer this time around.
Once the renovation work on the home is complete, Kanitra plans to use it partly as a private vacation retreat for he and and his wife, and partly as a non-profit center to foster migrant ties between New Jersey and Sicily.
“It’s our way of giving back to both sides of the ocean,” says Kanitra.
