Let’s leave aside for a moment all the pros and cons of equity release. It’s certainly been responsible for both the asset bubble in property and it’s artificially kept the tills ringing on UK high streets, but it’s borrowed money and borrowed time … sadly, one always has to pay the bill eventually. And though things are going to get bloody on the high street and elsewhere, you can make a good case for saying it’s time we learned to live within our means for a change. But the collapse in equity release could be very good news for anyone looking at property investment in Italy just now. It’s fair to say that the next time you look round that villa in Tuscany or trullo in Puglia, you won’t be competing with a dozen other buyers. You’re also less likely to see prices steadily rising. In fact we’d bank on it – some of the more inflated property prices are going to be steadily deflating over the next couple of years. Bear in mind that the Americans and the US dollar have got it just the same only worse. It does mean that any buyer with funds to invest (or at least no problem raising a mortgage) is in a very good bargaining position and there should be value to be had.

The downside of course, is that the euro is strong, eye wateringly strong to UK and American eyes. But do your sums and a reduction in selling price can still bring you out on top. Which begs the question … who DOES find it cheap to get into property investment in Italy as summer rolls on in Europe? With the currencies of the Asian countries such as China and India performing more strongly against the euro, you could be seeing a movement of Asian money into Italy.

Property investment in Italy.

So what’s to see for those researching property for sale in Pisa? The sights in Pisa merely begin with the Leaning Tower (perhaps Italy’s best known sight along with the Colosseum in Rome). The Torre Pendente is, in fact, just one element of the Campo dei Miracoli, the ‘field of miracles’ which forms the Cathedral square of Pisa and is, arguably, the finest surviving collection of medieval public architecture anywhere in Europe. There is the Cathedral or Duomo, a magnificent exercise in blending the Gothic with Byzantine and Moorish notes, thus creating the opulent style that is Pisan Romanesque. There is the circular Baptistery, with its exquisite tracery in white marble. And there is the remarkable Camposanto. Fine museums and galleries include the Museo dell’Opera del Duomo and the Museo Nazionale di S. Matteo, and there are a number of fine medieval palazzi and churches. A must see is the Medici Palace, also the Borgo Stretto - an area where one strolls beneath medieval arcades along the River Arno.

Find listings of property for sale in Pisa here, both within the old town and in the surrounding province of the same name (in Tuscany region).

But let’s turn it around, and look at how NOT to invest in property. We’re going to look at a UK company here, but there are plenty of parallels in the United States … and the basic tenets hold good for property investment in Italy. For a case study of all the things you can do wrong, let’s look at the collapse of Inside Track in the UK a few weeks ago now. Investors in Inside Track were told that it was an ‘armchair investment’. While sitting in your armchair may do it for investing in stocks and shares, as long as you have a laptop computer open in front of you, that’s no way to invest in property. If you’re buying a property you’ve never seen then you’re asking for trouble. I wouldn’t buy a car I’d never seen, in fact I wouldn’t buy a bag of apples I’d never seen (one reason I don’t shop for my groceries online is I want to pick the best stuff) so why would I shell out a quarter of a million pounds on an apartment I’d never seen in Manchester, Newcastle or Tuscany come to that.

Chuck in the fact that ‘investors’ were piling into new build, which is at the polar opposite of investment properties where you can add value. New builds are sold at a premium – in time they will enjoy capital appreciation, but short term they will only lose value as the lustre of the new paint, spick and span new grounds and shiny Bosch kitchen gradually fades. And then you are competing with ten, a hundred, five hundred other new apartments in the same block. Simple supply and demand here – you put a hundred of anything on the market at once and buyers can pick or choose. Price drops and if you hit a bad patch in the property market (oh look, here’s one now) you’re stuffed. No added value, lots of negative equity. The lessons for Italian property investment are no different. Next week, I’ll be looking at some more traps to avoid and how you should start researching your purchase. In the meantime, check out some Italian investment properties and take a look at the various regions to get you focused on where to buy property in Italy.

But the big surprise for the first-time visitor to Italy is finding how diverse the regional cuisine is. Having based your idea of typical foods of Italy on a visit to your local Italian restaurant, you find that you have been sampling a much reduced menu. So northern Italian cuisine (the regions of Val d’Aosta, Piedmont, Veneto et al) typically uses far less olive oil and pasta, far more butter and rice. It’s no surprise then that risotto is a northern Italian dish. Head up into Trentino-Alto Adige, which southern and central Italians would dismiss as ‘Germany’ and you’re going to find sauerkraut and dumplings on the menu. Across in Friuli-Venezia Giulia, meanwhile, polenta takes the place of rice and pasta.

Central Italy has a superb cuisine, with Emilia-Romagna and Tuscany, but be prepared again to adjust your idea of typical foods of Italy … no such thing as spaghetti bolognese in Bologna, be prepared to eat stuffed trotters and eels instead. And as we head into the deep south of Puglia, Basilicata and Calabria there are cuisines with influences from Greece, Albania and North Africa. Enjoy the ‘typical foods of Italy’ but keep an open mind … and palate.

Check out houses for sale in Italy, find a superb selection of hotel rooms in Italy, or research your villa and apartment rentals in Italy at the click of a button.

400,000 of us move abroad each year, and new rules allow us to move our pensions offshore too. The scheme you’re looking for is a Qualifying Registered Overseas Pension Scheme (QROPS). Move your money there (and to a jurisdiction such as the Isle of Man, the Republic of Ireland, Singapore or Hong Kong, and your cash is no longer subject to HM Revenue and Customs rules. The benefits to the hard-done-by UK pensioner are eye popping. Compare the Isle of Man’s system to the UK’s. Bigger tax-free lump sums, inheritance tax a tenth of UK rates, freedom to buy into residential property. Best of all … no need to buy into a miserable annuity paying out 6% a year. Wait five years and you can take your pension as cash to invest as YOU choose. You could, therefore, take your bunce and put it into Italian property investments should you wish. Those buying property in Italy, take note.

There are grains and whisps of truth whirling about here. Only a fool (or an estate agent) would deny that there are problems. Now is certainly not the best of times to sell, though it is conversely a very good time to buy property in Italy and elsewhere. Get the finance sorted out and you should be able to drive a good, hard bargain. But there is no single property market. So you’re probably okay if you bought a solid Tuscan barn, needing work, to which you can add value, at any point over the past few years. They are in finite supply, they have inherent quality and buyability and you can do building work which will add more in value than in costs to do. You’re probably not okay if you bought one of a new development of 500 apartments in a part of the world where nobody really wants to go on holiday or indeed to live (Bulgaria anyone).

My faith in the such pieces diminishes when I read stuff such as that in The Times. It assumes there is one market, whereas anyone who spends any time buying and selling and researching ANY area, will tell you there are dozens. My own experience of property in London is contrary to the headline story of giddy rises followed by a plummet in property prices from late 2007. In fact, the prices of most housing stock had stalled or slowed over the past three years – nothing wrong with that, as most investors would rather have sensible single digit growth each year rather than boom and bust. The areas that were racing were always going to fall again. It doesn’t take much research to find properties with potential, as evidenced by our Tuscany example here. Buy wisely, do the work, and watch your property grow in value.

The reasons for caution at home are pretty clear – why would you buy anything in the UK just now when even the most bullish estate agents are talking about 5% falls in prices over the coming year? The more bearish, and disinterested observers of the market predicting a stomach turning fall of 25%. But those looking for safe havens in overseas property markets need to be cautious too. There have been some very nasty shocks for property investors in Spain over the past year, with overbuilding, and investors – eager to get into the market – paying over the odds. Britons have also piled eagerly, and sometimes unwisely, into frontier property in Eastern Europe. When the hype dies down, Bulgaria and rural Slovenia have a long way to go to having the infrastructure that will make them investment sure bets.

In this climate, investment property in Italy looks a much safer bet. Italy is an attractive and diverse country, with a solid infrastructure, superb food and wine and a culture that’s appealing to holidaymakers. Even those who’ve never set foot in the Bel Paese will know Rome and Venice, Florence and Milan. Anywhere on the peninsula you’re going to find attractive regional centres – property investment in Rome, Naples, Bologna Amalfi or Sicily is far less of a risk than in the ‘new markets’ of Eastern Europe.

But if you’re looking at overseas investment property and buying investment properties in Italy, the same rules apply as back home. Don’t go for the big new build developments – you’ll pay a premium for new property and if you’re looking to rent you’ll likely be competing with lots of other buy to let landlords. Character properties, one-offs alongside a street of residential properties are always a better deal. And look for value, it’s a buyers’ market just now. You could do a lot worse than look at some of the auction property online UK websites for bargains.

Property in Italy

This ‘anti marketing’ is probably an outward manifestation of the occasional Italian obsession with privacy, and with other people knowing their business dealings, also of a powerful mistrust of the authorities and the tax police. Much in Italy is still done on a nod and a wink, though the practice of declaring one price for a property sale to the tax authorities, while actually realising a much higher one thanks to envelopes stuffed with euro notes, is fast declining. So how DO you find estate agents Calabria, not to mention the homes they’re trying to sell? You’ll find a selection of property for sale in Calabria on keyitaly.com of course, and this will give you a feel for the market and the prices. But the first thing to do is unarguably to take a holiday in the place. We never cease to be amazed by people who ask us about property in a certain region … then profess ignorance as to whereabouts in Italy the region is. Calabria is a beautiful region, with endless miles of coastline (being the toe of Italy, you’re never far from the sea). It has superb mountainous national parks.

It has coastline on the Ionian and Tyrrhenian Seas and abuts Sicily across the Strait of Messina. There is the vast mountain plateau of La Sila, which can be snowclad in winter as well as sunbaked in the summer. Coastal resorts include spectacular Tropea, with its cliffside dwellings, beautiful Cosenza and Scilla. There are dense pine forests, countless lakes. And this is an ancient land, colonised by the Romans, the Greeks, by Byzantium and the Goths (as well as a dozen invaders since). There are historic towns including Catanzaro, Cosenza, Lamezia Terme, Crotone and Reggio Calabria. There are Swabian castles, ancient monasteries and tiny mountain hamlets.

Above all, there is endless sea and sun. So before you start seeking out estate agents Calabria, start with your own researches. Take a holiday, hire a car, travel around, find properties you fancy (and there will often be real estate in Calabria standing empty) and ask around. The vendor will invaribably eventually appear!
Property for sale, Calabria, Italy

Pick up the Daily Mail and the Daily Express, and dig into the travel and money blogs on the Daily Telegraph website and a disturbing picture seems to emerge … of a UK steadily depleting as pats steadily become expats. Depending on how far to the right your views swing, this is the fault of the Labour Government, rotten British weather, increasing levels of crime, soaring numbers of immigrants, the high cost of living, the impossible cost of property, even the difficulty of finding a parking space. Whatever you believe about the cons of living in Britain (and there are obviously plenty of pros too, or inward migration wouldn’t be as high as it is), it’s certainly true that you’re going to find undreamed of value the further south you go. In Italy property sales are burgeoning precisely because of the terrific value per square foot you’ll find in regions such as Puglia, Calabria and (for the more adventurous) underexplored Molise.

Jon Davey has a unique perspective, having worked as an estate agent (or realtor) for 10 years in south London before upping sticks and moving to Puglia, in the deep south. Jon lives just outside Lecce, a quite beautiful and very ancient town. He has no regrets … well almost none. ‘There are things I miss about London certainly, though that’s not a problem, providing you plan it right. Puglia is lovely, it’s unspoiled, but it does have some big towns, good coastal resorts and a good infrastructure. And crucially we’re within reach of an international airport … and London if we need it.’

Jon reckons that the mistake most expats make is to buy in ‘holiday mode’ without thinking of what it’s like to live in a foreign country 24/7. Sure you’re enthusiastic, bowled over by your trip to see the trulli of Puglia … but slow down. Is there an expat community for support? Can you get the foods you want? Is that dream home plumbed for water, and can you get your English language TV channels. ‘I don’t suggest total immersion in the culture … not at first. You need home comforts to ease the transition. Conversely, nothing seems odder to me than people who move here and live in a ‘little England’ bubble. Give yourself a foothold back in the UK … even if you never go back.’ Jon has worked as a consultant, helping people settle and has found that, in Italy, property sales tend to work best when people give themselves ‘a financial and psychological fallback’. In the coming weeks, we’ll be looking at ways to ease the transition to your new life in Italy.

Italy - property listings
Puglia property for sale

Tourism in the region has kicked off considerably in recent years - as well as lovely coastline there are beautifully rugged inland mountains, and not too far from the beach. As ever in Italy, development on the seaboard isn’t unequivocally good, there have been some pretty nasty developments, but the Calabrian coastline is largely unmarred by the worst type of Mediterranean developments. There are good clear and very warm waters (legendary Italian poet Gabriele d’Annunzio called the coastline by Reggio Calabria ‘the most beautiful kilometre in Italy’. Scilla, on the Tyrrhenian coast, is quite lovely and the setting for some of Homer’s stories; there is Capo Vaticano on the Tyrrhenian too, which has terrific swimming near Tropea. Squillace manages to combine seaside resort and archaeological site, while Stilo has a superb Norman castle and Byzantine church.

This is a theme in Calabria - the best of the modern resort alongside impossibly ancient relics: this was, after all, a centre of Magna Graecia, and thousands of years of history are ever around you. In our continuing pieces on Calabria Italian property, we’ll be looking in greater depth at some of the loveliest towns, both on the coast and in the mountains of Calabria.

Calabria property