GAri and Tom Holm are an American couple who won Italy with the aim of fighting desertification with their famous houses that sell for 1 euro. However, the couple spent around 160 thousand euros in total because they fell in love with the region, but without getting the 'famous' one-euro house. However, Gary and Tom do not regret taking themselves to Sambuca di Sicilia.
In an interview with Business Insider, Tom said it all started in 2019 when he read about the subject online. Remember that in that year alone the city put dozens of houses up for sale for one euro—an initiative that spread to other parts of Italy.
“I remember reading an article online in 2019 about one euro houses when Gary was working in the UK, much closer to Sicily than our hometown of Los Angeles,” he said.
At that point, Tom sent an email to a contact and received a response from Sambuca Mayor Leo Ciaccio, who explained that if the couple was interested in learning more about the program, tours around town and home visits were available.
“She is [Tam] We toured and looked at properties, but we were like, 'Are they really selling these houses for a euro?' We certainly had some doubts like that. It turns out that the auction started with one euro. We bid 5,000 euros for each and lost,” said Carey.
“But we knew this town was special. I immediately fell in love with it. So instead, we went to a private sale. We looked at 10 or 15 houses and the one we picked was special,” he added.
Tom said that the initial investment in the house was 19 thousand euros. At the time, they thought they would paint the place, but the scene changed. “The house needs plumbing, some electrical work and more,” he said. When they found out that the house next door was also for sale, they ended up buying it for 8 thousand euros. In total, they spent about 160 thousand euros.
“If you were lucky enough to get one of the Euro houses, they would do most of the paperwork, but there were some conditions. You had a deadline to renovate, you had to hire some contractors and there were a lot of guidelines,” he said.
However, he noted: “I think the 1 euro project is brilliant because it gave some people the opportunity to buy houses for very little money and that's what brought us here,” he added.
The couple shares quite a bit about their lives and ongoing renovations on social media.
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