Selling Out Inherited Houses – Old Swabian and Pannonian Villas Sold as Soon as Advertised (PHOTO)

An old, locally popular song talks about selling an old inherited house in the context of love. Today, those who sell these houses throughout Vojvodina have much more tangible reasons. And as soon as they are advertised, old Swabian and Banat villas are sold.

Nenad Djedovic, a sales agent at Solis Nekretnine from Novi Sad, says for eKapija that the demand for old houses in Vojvodina exceeds the supply.

– Mostly Swabian houses from the early 20th century, of the salon type, with a floor height of up to 4 meters, are sold. They are characterized by solid construction and a wall thickness of a brick and a half, so, more than half a meter, and the aim is to adapt them into business spaces for doctor’s offices, law or IT offices, playrooms, apartments… Furthermore, most of them have old wine cellars ideal for wineries and restaurants, with a constant temperature of around fifteen degrees in both summer and winter – Djedovic says.

According to him, these are mostly old family houses which the inheritors either cannot maintain or have no interest in doing so, or to live in them, so they are selling them.

– We’re talking large floor areas, of at least 100 to over 500 m2, often with several ares of land to go along. The prices range from EUR 10,000 to 30,000 if they are around 50 kilometers away from larger places to up to EUR 100,000 if they are nearer to a city – Djedovic says and points out that the growing trend of the supply and demand of such houses is noticeable everywhere in Vojvodina, from Zrenjanin, through Backa Palanka, to Sombor.

One such authentic Swabian house is up for sale in the wider Zrenjanin city area, with a floor area of around 130 m2 plus a wine cellar and other auxiliary rooms. The house, which is offered at a price of EUR 98,000, is over 120 years old and used to belong, according to Djedovic, to the Vojvodina Swabians, one of whose descendants even came over there to claim it in the 1990s, but such properties had mostly been made public property following the Second World War.

In Banat, there’s a great supply and demand for old Banat houses with recognizable Pannonian architectural features, built from a combination of mud and straw, with the narrower side facing the street, or L-shaped houses, with a double orientation.

They are characterized by semi-arch façade elements and rich ornaments, double windows and the mandatory retracted hallways, which are either open or separated by glass panes, and large einfront gates, whereas old Swabian houses are recognized for their characteristic porch columns.

It is precisely thanks to this rich history and valuable architecture that they are often protected by the state as cultural goods, our interviewee notes, so the purchasers are obliged, when having them reconstructed, to protect the old facades and preserve them in their authentic form.

– Some are even becoming dilapidated, because the state doesn’t have the funds to maintain them, so it’s better to sell a really old house for cheap, just to save it. However, among those interested, there are also plenty of construction entrepreneurs who want to demolish them and build multi-family buildings in their place, which, if the house is under state protection, is, of course, not allowed – Djedovic says and adds that such houses, which preserve the spirit of the old rural Vojvodina, are becoming scarce in the market.

Indeed, whichever phone number from the ads we called, the house had been sold, even if advertised not too long before.

B. Petrovic