Couple buy Spanish village for same price as average UK house

manchestereveningnews.co.uk:

A couple has managed to snag an entire Spanish village for less than the average house price back home, spending just £288,000 on a settlement boasting 62 properties.

Elvira Fafián, head of Aldeas Abandonadas Real, said: "They contacted us because they were looking for something big like this, with lots of houses and land, far from the big cities." However, there was one significant drawback; all the buildings in the village were in ruins.

Dutch natives Maaike Geurts and Tibor Strausz have embarked on an ambitious project to rejuvenate Bárcena de Bureba, purchased in 2022 for €350,000 (£288k), envisioning it as an eco-community.

While progress is being made with the first four families expected to join soon, the couple still consider Amsterdam their main base until the village can be transformed into a fully habitable and self-sustaining place.