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The Independentflipped into MoneyMore than one million calls made to 159 anti-scam phone number
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Daily Mailflipped into MoneyMy father was sold a trust to beat care fees that's useless and will cost £3,000 to cancel: SALLY SORTS IT
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Brit buys Italian house for one euro - and has people queuing to rent it
A British man who bought his first home for just ‘one euro’ in Italy says he now has hundreds of people queuing to wanting to rent it out - and is now planning on buying another one. George Laing, 32, bought his derelict, three-storey home for 85p in Mussomeli, Italy, in December 2022, under a council scheme to encourage people to renovate abandoned homes. Admin fees, agency costs and energy certificates took the total to 5,000 euros (£4,300) for the property. However George – who lives between Mussomeli, Sicily, and Eastbourne, East Sussex – has so far managed to keep the renovations to his ‘shoe-string’ budget of less than £10,000. After fixing the leaky roof, adding electricity and reconnecting the water supply among other infrastructural issues, George has nearly renovated the entire house almost entirely on his own. He has documented his project on social media, primarily on his Instagram page @george_laing_. Now he claims more than 500 followers have signed up through his website to a queue to rent the home in support of his journey. Buoyed by the response, he bought a second one euro home in the Mussomeli area in April 2025. George said: “I love it, it’s been the best decision I’ve made. I’ve got a waiting list of more than 500 people waiting to rent my home out. “I just use my website and a booking form, I don’t have to use Booking.com or Airbnb – it’s edging up to nearly 600 people now. “It’s the power of social media. It was about a year ago that I launched my Instagram – I’ve got 164,000 followers there and 70k followers on Facebook “I think it’s a load of people who are saying that they’re following my dream and want to rent it out when it’s finished. “You can do it without a lot of money behind you, but the backing from social media has definitely helped, because I also make money from content creation. “Now, I’m in the process of buying another one euro home. It’s a five minute walk from mine, and overall it will cost me four grand – a similar price to the first one. “This one should be slightly easier. I got pretty lucky, it’s structurally sound, it’s huge and it won’t take too much work. “That project will start in the next two to three months. Whether I go for another property on top of that depends on how much money I make from the first one. “If I have the money I would love to have whole rows of one euro homes – I could buy a whole community, that’s the long-term goal.” One stipulation for the one euro home scheme is a three year …
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