A prefab in the country

Like many Europeans, you too have probably daydreamed about picturesque Italian villages where you can buy a house for just a couple of New Zealand dollars. Italian village authorities have been offering up properties for as little as one euro in order to keep their towns alive as youngsters move to big cities and the elderly have nobody to leave their rustic homes to. Facing the same sorts of issues, small towns in France and Croatia have launched similar schemes. And now the Germans are trying to get on the act, too.

- Cathrin Schaer

Well, sort of. In typical German style, it's not quite as wildly romantic as a one-euro shanty on a French mountainside. Instead, municipalities in rapidly depopulating former East Germany are promoting what they call Probewohnen, or “trial residency”. Hundreds have applied for an apartment, at no or minimal cost, for several weeks. The idea is that they get a taste of life in the East and then potentially decide to stay. Goerlitz, a town on the border with Poland, has had a scheme like this in various forms since 2015. Other towns have caught on more recently. Last year Guben, population 16,000, started its own version - besides an apartment, the city will even give you a bicycle to get around on. Later this summer, Eisenhuettenstadt, population 24,000, will welcome its first trial residents.

Other East German cities, including Frankfurt an der Oder, Wittenberge, Dessau-Rosslau and Eberswalde, have also flirted with temporary tenants.