A California-based millennial has purchased a two-bedroom home in Italy for less than $50,000 after despairing at the state of the US housing market.
Lauren Scott, 29, decided to take her house search international in 2020 after struggling to compete with other buyers hoping to secure a property in Los Angeles.
The Ohio native had been freelancing in the LA film industry for 10 years and wanted to buy her first home in the area with a budget of $400,000.
But Scott struggled to compete with other Golden State buyers in bidding wars, so initially turned her sights to other US states.
‘I didn’t think I was ever going to be able to buy in California, much less Los Angeles, which is somewhere I’ve kind of called home for such a long time and that really sucked,’ Scott told CNBC Make It.
Scott scoured the housing market in Florida, where her family lives, but found she couldn’t find a job there that aligned with her West Coast lifestyle.
Finding nothing but disappointment in the quality of life offered in the US, the content creator widened her search to Mexico, Portugal and Italy.
‘I don’t want to completely demolish my savings or go into debt to buy a home here, especially with the state of the country right now,’ Scott said.
California-based millennial Lauren Scott (pictured) has purchased a two-bedroom home in Italy for less than $50,000 after despairing at the state of the US housing market
Scott said she set her budget at $50,000 and began house-hunting online, eventually finding a two-bedroom, one-bathroom townhouse an hour outside Florence (location pictured above)
She settled on Italy after finding properties there to be cheaper. Scott hired a translator, lawyer and real estate agent to aid her quest for a home abroad.
‘I didn’t fly over and bought sight unseen, which I don’t recommend,’ she told CNBC. ‘I reached out to a lot of agents and just ended up paying somebody to do it all for me.’
Scott said she set her budget at $50,000 and began house-hunting online, eventually finding a two-bedroom, one-bathroom townhouse an hour outside Florence.
The property comes with picturesque mountain views, which Scott displayed via Instagram to her 80,000 followers.
‘I didn’t want to deal with a car since I’m not there full time and just being in the mountains and having that view made me feel super at peace,’ Scott said.
She added that the previous owner left the property ‘completely furnished’ because she ‘just wanted to get out and move to a different part of Italy’.
California-based millennial Lauren Scott (pictured) has purchased a two-bedroom home in Italy for less than $50,000 after despairing at the state of the US housing market
Scott’s two-bedroom home was priced at a cool 32,000 euros – or $34,905 – plus fees
The property is located an hour outside of Florence and cost a fraction of a US home
The previous owner told her the price was a cool 32,000 euros – or $34,905 – because the hot water boiler needed repairing.
‘I really lucked out because there’s nothing wrong with it except for needing to replace that one part of the home,’ Scott told CNBC.
She paid the full asking price plus an additional 4,200 euros, or $4,581 in closing costs, using a 20,000 euro loan from a local bank to help purchase the house while avoiding depleting her savings.
Scott secured the property in August 2022 and flew over to see it for the first time three months later.
‘It was just a surreal feeling,’ she said. ‘I couldn’t believe I owned a home in my 20s because I didn’t think this would ever happen. I think I cried too.’
Scott, who still lives in a $1,695-per-month studio in LA, considered renting her Italian hideaway out, but decided against it over concerns that tenants could break or damage the property.
‘I’m kind of protective over my house,’ she told CNBC.
The 29-year-old film industry freelancer took her house search international in 2020 after struggling to compete with other buyers hoping to secure a property in Los Angeles
Scott said the property now serves an asset or a ‘retirement plan’ because she believes she’s never going to be able to retired in the US.
‘I’m thinking of it more as a long-term investment to get out of the US,’ she said.
‘As a freelancer, it’s actually concerning because I don’t always have health care, I don’t have a 401K and I can’t afford to invest, so I think just being able to know that I have something secure and a place to call my own for when I am older is really comforting.’
Scott said that although she was thrilled to secure her first home in her twenties, she feels sad that she won’t be able to afford to buy a home in her native America.
‘It makes me sad because what’s keeping me here is my parents,’ she told CNBC.
‘I don’t want to move all across the world and then not be able to see my family a lot.
‘It’s sad to know that my parents could buy a home and my grandparents could, too, but with inflation, it’s not as accessible for my generation anymore.
‘I don’t think that’s fair to our generation and the ones coming after us.’
