[DBMarcos99]

http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/shortcuts/2013/feb/20/kensington-houses-one-pound-liverpool

In England too!
Can’t be long before it happens in Spain?

[Chopera]

I mentioned a while back that in parts of Extremadura the council gives away plots of land for free, but you have to spend something like 6 months of the year living there. They were doing this during the boom years as well. I guess the council just want people to live there so they can take their money some other way.

[Anonymous]

So why don’t people get together and restore entire villages? It would be great for those who want an active retirement as they could be hands on with the restoration and then have a safe community to live in. The few locals who would still be living there would gain as they’d probably then have a shop to go to and even a bar etc.

It would be so much better than buying a badly build characterless box in an urbanisation??

[Chopera]

Some of the abandoned villages were bought up by English schools, and they run intensive courses there (only English is spoken)

http://www.diverbo.es/es/adultos/ingles/pueblo-ingles?utm_source=google&utm_medium=sem&utm_campaign=ESP%5CMarca_PuebloIngles&gclid=CIGZn7STx7UCFeXLtAodLi0Aag

http://www.grupovaughan.com/cursos-ingles/vaughan-town-pueblo-angloparlante

I’ve also heard of them being used for art courses, meditation centres, etc.

According to this article the Chinese and Arabs are buying them up as well:

http://www.02b.com/en/notices/2013/01/well-off_chinese_and_arabs_start_to_chase_spanish_abandoned_vilages_3729.php

[Anonymous]

@DBMarcos99 wrote:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/shortcuts/2013/feb/20/kensington-houses-one-pound-liverpool

In England too!
Can’t be long before it happens in Spain?

That Kensington area in Liverpool is full of drug addicts and prostitutes. I would not even walk in front of those house, let alone live in them.

[DBMarcos99]

@flosmichael wrote:

@DBMarcos99 wrote:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/shortcuts/2013/feb/20/kensington-houses-one-pound-liverpool

In England too!
Can’t be long before it happens in Spain?

That Kensington area in Liverpool is full of drug addicts and prostitutes. I would not even walk in front of those house, let alone live in them.

You can find drug addicts and prostitiutes here in Westminster, London! Or in the Salamanca district of Madrid come to think of it. Of course Kensington in Liverpool has its problems – that’s why those houses are going for a pound – one of the conditions is that you have to be resident there for at least 5 years. If you get enough people move in, it can transform an area.
I believe that Seseña (that big housing development of fame between Madrid and Toledo) is trying a slightly different approach, by granting startups free accommodation and office facilities. my hunch is that the Liverpool scheme will have more success, but we will see..
http://loogic.com/proyecto-fast-para-acelerar-empresas-innovadoras/

[Anonymous]

@itsme: You have lived in Spain & is married to a Spaniard. By now I am sure that you must have observed that Spain in a indivualist Country. Hence until recently they did not win anything which required team work.

For them to get together and to restore an entire village. I think “Jamon Serrano” will fly first. THe spanish idea of retirement is to sit in the cortijo/beach/with family & friends and pass the time.

[Anonymous]

When I watched the start of the transformation of Docklands in London, I thought class war was just around the corner. Along the Highway in Stepney you had rough council estates on one side and Yuppie housing on the other, separated by high fencing. But the BMWs and Ford Escorts had to meet in the streets, and I expected a blood bath.

But nothing happened and look at the place now? The council house dwellers were overwhelmed by the Yuppies, sold their scruffy flats to them and moved to Clacton. The same scruffy flats are selling for a million pounds each now, and everybody’s happy.

[Anonymous]

@shakeel wrote:

@itsme: You have lived in Spain & is married to a Spaniard. By now I am sure that you must have observed that Spain in a indivualist Country. Hence until recently they did not win anything which required team work.

For them to get together and to restore an entire village. I think “Jamon Serrano” will fly first. THe spanish idea of retirement is to sit in the cortijo/beach/with family & friends and pass the time.

Sorry Shakeel, I should have made my post clearer. Of course the Spanish wouldn’t do the restoration….I meant why don’t Brits do it, if they dream of a new life in Spain why don’t they set up a group of people and buy an old village and live in Little Britain up on a mountain with a cheaper lifestyle and their sunshine. ?

The Spanish are the ones looking at the places in the countryside falling down and will go off and live in a nice shiny new (but badly built) apartment in town. Easier to clean and to get to the shops for the ladies 😉

Or else a Spaniard would buy a village house for peanuts and sell it on for 1000% more to a stupid Brit who thinks that ‘it’s so cheap compared to ‘Skegness’…..

[Anonymous]

@Rocker wrote:

When I watched the start of the transformation of Docklands in London, I thought class war was just around the corner. Along the Highway in Stepney you had rough council estates on one side and Yuppie housing on the other, separated by high fencing. But the BMWs and Ford Escorts had to meet in the streets, and I expected a blood bath.

But nothing happened and look at the place now? The council house dwellers were overwhelmed by the Yuppies, sold their scruffy flats to them and moved to Clacton. The same scruffy flats are selling for a million pounds each now, and everybody’s happy.

This was because there is lots of money in London area.

In Liverpool there is no money as the government is happy to see and has the goal that the North West goes totally bankrupt. There is no way that Kensington will ever regenerate.

[Anonymous]

Talking of regeneration, you have to give the UK government its due. They encouraged the Japanese to move to Tyneside for their car production, the DVLA was moved to Swansea, the BBC moved to Salford, Scotland got its oil and Trident, so it leaves Liverpool.

It’s too cruel to bring the slave trade back, but maybe Murdoch could be persuaded to move production of The Sun from Wapping to Liverpool.

[Anonymous]

@itsme: no problem. I just thought that it was curious that you had not observed this aspect of the Spanish mentality.

I had for years thought that UK government should set up a retirement homes and give the elderly a choice to either retire in Devon/Bournmouth. The winter months would be ideal for health reason, lack of vitimen C, SAD etc and it would be cheaper & will free up spaces in UK.

I do not think that the civil servents, Council staff are capable of thinking outside their pension.

[Anonymous]

Agreed Shakeel. It would be so much cheaper to buy up blocks of flats in Spain and put those in council residential care out in Spain rather than in the UK homes. Make them rental options rather than to buy though and they’d be making more than enough to pay for their carers.

I’ve said before on here that I thought it a good idea for our block of flats, if an investor bought the repos for 15k each from the banks and had them all rented out to older people and one flat with three carers/nurses in. The mayors sister, who owns a flat in the block, looked at me and said ‘but who has the money to do it?’… ha ha. I should have said ‘You my Dear, you and your brother the Mayor have all the money 😉

I’m currently doing a ‘care of the older person’ course as it’s a way I can work around my two young children and their school hours. It’ll also hopefully be insightful and doing a ‘good deed’ by helping someone older in their day to day lives will make me less angry about the whole Spanish situation. Think positive, think positive……….

[Author]

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