The new Tuscanys

Catherine Coley

FOR all those Arcadians who imagined spending summers in an elderly Tuscan farmhouse surrounded by streams and olive groves, some bad news. Tuscany is running out of affordable houses of the sort that Britons want as second homes. Even a run-down farmhouse with a couple of acres can cost as much as £300,000, according to Naomi Greatbanks of Knight Frank, and almost the same again to render habitable and comfortable. Frankly, it costs about half as much to buy a semiderelict farmhouse in Herefordshire, and it's easier to keep an eye on the builders.

In the 1960s and 1970s. when large numbers of Britons set up home in rural Tuscany for the first time, it was all rather cheaper, although they were regarded as brave to buy unrestored houses in what was then a remote and bucolic area. These days it is sanitised, gentrified and correspondingly expensive, and there are plenty of Britons around to share their experiences of second-home ownership at drinks parties.

We British are a conservative lot when it comes to buying second homes abroad. According to Charles Weston-Baker of FPD Savills, 30 per cent of us buy in Spain, 25 per cent in Portugal and France respectively, a mere 5 per cent in Italy and 2 per cent in Greece. Yet there are plenty of other parts of the Mediterranean and central Europe which haven't succumbed to a deluge of second-home owners, and where prices are still blissfully low. Where are the new Tuscanys, and just how brave do you have to be to live there?

What about Slovenia and Croatia, right next door to Italy, and a prime holidayhome destination for Roman generals? Both countries are recovering well from the war and are pedalling hard to meet the criteria for EU membership. They are readily accessible from Britain — there are direct flights to Ljubljana and Zagreb from Heathrow — and their economies are sufficiently stable to tempt investors. They have pretty coastlines, plenty of older houses, summer sun and reasonable food.

'Croatia is where Italy was 50 years ago,' says Grant Boyd-Gibbins. a British property developer based in Budapest. 'There's a huge supply of Tuscan-style farmhouses that you can buy for £5,000 upwards. They all need restoring and most don't have electricity.' The only snag is finding them. Few British agents handle property in Croatia, although FPD Savills is thinking of taking on some of the better coastal villas.

The best way to start buying a second home in central or eastern Europe is to look on the Internet. Although there are plenty of sites for agents in Croatia, most are, unsurprisingly, in Croatian, and few have pictures. Try www.lavsa.com/hbOome_en.html, the Croatian Real-Estate Exchange, and www. internationalre al est atedi rectory .com for a good selection of listings. One Englishlanguage website with good pictures is www.top-invest.net/offers/, which has a beautiful old house on the waterfront in Milna, on the island of Brae. for 590,000. Unlike buyers in Italy, France or Spain, you will have to go ahead without the help of an established network of agents and lawyers. 'Roll up your sleeves, drive down there and start talking to people,' Boyd-Gibbins advises.

Anyone from a country where Croatians are allowed to buy property — this includes Britain, America and most Western nations — can buy a house in Croatia. It's not always easy. For Sale signs are rare, and you would do well to take the names of a few estate agents with you when you go. If you do decide to buy, employ a local lawyer and visit www.cronek.com/eng/pitanja.asp for useful advice on Croatian property law.

Istria — the northern Croatian coast — and the Dalmatian islands are probably your best bet for an attractive, safe holiday home. The south is rather too close to recent war zones for comfort, and if Albania erupts, southern Croatia, including the historic town of Dubrovnik, is likely to be affected.

Although it's further away from troubled areas, Slovenia is a less enticing prospect than Croatia for second-home owners, despite having some of the most beautiful mountain scenery in Europe. Its strict property laws at present ban foreign buyers, a measure intended to keep dispossessed Italians and holidaying Austrians at bay. All this will change when Slovenia joins the EU, and the property laws may be liberalised as early as the end of 2003. Then you will have to be very quick off the blocks to beat other European buyers to any bargains.

If you don't mind being inland, or enjoy riding or shooting, Hungary is the ideal place for a holiday home. It is relatively easy for foreigners to buy houses, and some country cottages are extremely cheap, costing as little as £4,000 if they need restoring, although property prices have doubled over the past year and are continuing to rise. Highceilinged apartments in elegant Buda houses cost between £30.000 and £75.000 on

http://investbudapest.com. or try www.ehome.hu for listings throughout the country. The very cheapest or most derelict houses are usually not on any websites, and there is no substitute for going to Hungary to look for them. At the other end of the scale, you can buy a Chambord lookalike just outside Budapest for $6.3 million: look at www.virtualhungary.comipalace/.

Foreign buyers are firmly discouraged in the Czech Republic: you either have to live there or set up a business through which you can then buy a house. For the more ambitious, there are plenty of castles in need of restoration; many are listed on www.internationalrealtyservice.com. They include a 14th-century castle near Vlasim, in need of renovation, for $500,000.

Away from central Europe, another country that doesn't yet feature on secondhome bestseller lists is Morocco, which is just a three-hour flight from Britain. and has a large stock of tantalisingly exotic older houses. Within the city walls of Marrakesh, you can buy a run-down house for as little as £35,000, which will cost at least the same again to restore. Some British companies will help you find and buy a house in Morocco — for advice visit The Best of Morocco at www.moroccotravel.comihtml_simplefForSale.html.

Needless to say, you won't be able to get a mortgage in Britain for any of these houses. Lenders have tentatively started to offer mortgages for houses abroad — Abbey National, one of the most adventur ous. will lend for houses in France, Spain, Portugal and Italy — but it is the exception rather than the rule. So you'll have to pay cash, take out a loan or persuade a local lender to advance you money.

Holiday houses in some parts of Europe are best left to professional risk takers or the very brave or foolhardy, who may reap the rewards in 30 years' time. Belgrade is a civilised city with a cosmopolitan feel and plenty of street cafés. The houses are beautiful, and the city is as big as Budapest. It is unlikely that another Milosevic will come to power, and a period of stability may ensue. But as no one really knows, house prices are still cheap: visit www.menadzer.co.yu (in Serbian) for details.

In northern Romania. Timisoara has some extremely elegant, large, classical town houses which cost as little as £20,000. Foreigners can buy only through a Romanian-registered company and with the goodwill of local officials. However, Timisoara is difficult to get to, not particularly safe, and has a very limited infrastructure. Then again, Italy wouldn't have looked a good bet for British buyers just after the second world war. Perhaps Romania's time will come.