Still good value in Tuscany

If you’ve always dreamed of a second home in Tuscany but got left behind as prices soared by 90 per cent in the last 10 years, take heart, writes Catherine Stott.

A new development within an hour of Pisa airport is bringing 23 affordable new homes to the market - a rarity in an area where planning controls are Draconian and property usually passes down through families.

Dennis Cardosi, managing director of developer Tuscan Dream, was brought up bilingually. Living between England and Tuscany, he has restored and sold 15 farmhouses.

Always keeping an ear close to the ground, he bought Selva Piana, a 10.5-acre site encompassing a crumbling farmhouse for restoration within a conservation area. After patient negotiation, he got permission for the new-build now on sale, and due to be completed in Spring 2009.

This northern part of Tuscany, the Garfagnano, offers a landscape utterly different from the geometric vineyards of ‘Chiantishire’.

In a steep wooded valley between the jagged ‘marble’ Apuan Alps and the Apennines, this is a terrain of stone villages perched above terraced vineyards and chestnut groves, with many graceful viaducts and torrential waterfalls.

It is brilliantly placed, just an hour from the posh seaside resort of Portofino and the same from the Abbettone ski resort, and 90 minutes from Florence - so there is unique year-round viability for both the cultural and the sporting life. River fishing, rock-climbing, hiking and biking are all hugely popular.

Selva Piana’s 23 spacious new homes, on a hillside with uninterrupted views over the valley, will be built in traditional Tuscan two-storey style by local craftsmen from local materials.

Two bedroom apartments start at 475,000 euros (£321,500), town houses at 800,000 euros (£541,000) and four bedroom villas at 1.2 million euros (£812,000).

For Tuscany, that’s pretty good value when you consider that the price in this province of Lucca - even for unrenovated property is, according to Lorrain Fontana at estate agency Novecento - is around 3,000 euros (£2,000) per sq m and double that for a stylish restoration.

Many clients fly down for the weekend by Ryanair, she says.

Though blissfully secluded in its gated hillside hideaway, Selva Piana is hardly isolated. A lighted, landscaped access road winds down to a main road three minutes away, taking you in five more minutes to a Leclerc hypermarket.

The medieval town of Castelnuovo with its cluster of super, vernacular shops and exquisitely restored opera house, Teatro Alfieri, is three miles away. Barga, another architectural gem much favoured for second homes by Brits, is little further.

Transport links are excellent. For a wine and food pilgrimage to Lucca, the little scenic railway costs 10 euros (£7) return. The efficient local bus goes everywhere.

The apartments and houses themselves will have terracotta and wood floors, tiled roofs, local chestnut wood doors, and the sumptuous kitchens and bathrooms with marble and granite surfaces you would expect in a top-of-the-range Italian property. Expats can plug into cable TV and broadband.

Stone steps will lead down to the communal swimming pool, but the villas can have their own infinity pool - on request - for an extra 50,000 euros (£35,000). Service charges from £150 per month on a pro rata basis, will include maintenance of pool, road and landscaping.

Local mayor Dr Maria Stella Adami wants newcomers to join in community life - and what could be more appealing than the Tuscan lifestyle, with exciting village fiestas and pageants, frequent summer concerts and operas - a welcoming locale where everyone puts on their best each early evening for a meet-and-greet promenade known as the passeggiata?

However small the village, there always seems to be an affordable family restaurant where Florentine steaks cover the plate, full-bodied local wine is cheap and they shave truffles onto melted cheese from a fungus the size of a baked potato.

By Catherine Scott

* All information correct at time of publication.