Ohio native Lauren Scott, 29, had lived in Los Angeles for 10 years working as a freelancer in the film industry, when she decided she was ready to buy a house. At the time, Scott lived in a studio apartment and paid $1,175 in rent.
Scott started her search in 2019 and wanted to stay under $400,000. But then the covid-19 pandemic hit in early 2020, and she found herself outbid every time she put in an offer on homes in the city.
“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 tells CNBC Make It.
Scott realized buying in California was close to impossible, so she started looking in other states like Florida, where her family lives. She quickly realized she wouldn’t be able to find a job that would match her current lifestyle.
Scott was also disappointed in the quality of life in the United States and set her sights on Mexico, Portugal and Italy because they all had weather similar to California.
The contention between locals and expats over rising housing costs, made Scott dismiss Mexico and Portugal pretty quickly. So she focused on properties in Italy. She set a budget of $50,000 and did her house hunting online.
“I didn’t fly over and bought sight unseen, which I don’t recommend,” Scott says. “I reached out to a lot of agents and just ended up paying somebody to do it all for me.”
After several weeks of searching, Scott found a two-bedroom, one-bath townhouse one hour outside of Florence. She could walk and use public transportation, which was a big priority for her.
“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 says.
