How This Couple From Belgium Found Their Italian Home

Our lovely clients Tine & Thierry from Belgium, recently bought a beautiful home in the Italian countryside. Read their account of how they discovered their new hideaway, and how others can do the same.

“We are a couple from Brussels and love Italy. We have spent many holidays in almost all parts of Italy together with our sons Arno and Simon. With each visit, the idea of buying a house has slowly slipped into our minds but it always seemed a distant dream.

In March 2019 Thierry offered Tine, as a birthday present, a four-day workshop called “Move to Italy Experience” and our purpose was to discover if we had better stop dreaming!

Thanks to the organisers David and Gary of D&G Design, it was a real experience, as promised, and we had a clear answer: our dream could perhaps be realised.”

DREAM OF RETIRING TO ITALY?

Take the first step to your new life in Italy by spending five days with us in Le Marche to gain all the advice you need.

View homes for sale, meet our property lawyer, real estate agents and fellow expats who made the move.

SIGN UP TO JOIN OUR WAITLIST

The Home Search Begins

“We stayed at the very quiet and beautiful Agriturismo Ramusè and on the day of arrival we were welcomed with a fantastic regional dinner to meet the organisers and other participants coming from all over over the world. There was a Californian couple, a lady from Dubai and a lady from Texas. We all came with the same question: can we, one day, buy a house in Italy, and how can we make it happen?

During our stay we received very detailed information from real estate agents and lawyers. How does buying property work in Italy, what are the costs, do you really need a lawyer, do you need a notary, as well as many other tips. We also made a trip through Le Marche to visit different houses for sale which showed us that the housing market was huge. One evening we had a lovely diner with two English couples who took the risk to completely change their lives and made the move to Italy.
They gave us a lot of helpful ideas and it was inspiring to listen to their stories.

David and Gary were so convinced that we could all succeed in becoming owners of Italian houses, that they organised a course to teach us how to make fresh pasta!

Meanwhile Paolo and his staff cooked fantastic meals every evening, topped with delicious Italian wines.”

move to italy experience — Highlights of D&G Design's Move to Italy Experience

House Hunting in Italy

“We not only had a fantastic break, but also returned to Belgium on 28th March 2019, with the feeling that our Italian dream was tangible. The “Move to Italy Experience” was the absolute beginning of a dream that ultimately came true. While we were back at work in Belgium David and Gary even visited and filmed a house that could match for us. We were glad that we had made so many great connections in Italy.

In November 2019 we made a trip to Perugia in Umbria to visit houses with different real estate agencies. The last day we saw the house of our dreams near Todi and we decided to go for it in February 2020.

As we live in Brussels and our Italian is just good enough to order some food in a restaurant we used an Italian property lawyer that David and Gary recommended, who did a great job. Between February 2020 and 17th July 2020 (the date on which we signed the deeds for our new home at the notary) we were constantly advised, supported and helped by David, Gary and our property lawyer.

Despite the distance and the fact that we had to continue to work every day, and most of all during these extremely strange and insecure times of lockdown due to the Covid-19 epidemic, David and Gary stayed in contact with us.”

READ MORE: BUYING PROPERTY IN ITALY

“For us, the most important thing, is that the team succeeded to take away the worries and stress that accompanies the buying of a house in another country, in another language and in the most insecure of times.

Last week, whilst sitting under our portico, swimming in our swimming pool and watching our olive trees blowing softly in the gentle breeze, we both reflected on the fact that all of this would not have been possible without David and Gary and their inestimable advice.

We now just wait for them to come along to our house, called “Il Sogno”, to have a great meal with the best Italian wines, give advice on how to make the interior of our house even more beautiful and then watch the sunset together.”

Tine and Thierry Devreker – Decraene

D&G – We cannot wait to visit as well!