Forbes declares Lucca, Italy is 2nd most idyllic place to live in Europe

September 16, 2:52 AMItalian Living ExaminerSerenella Leoni

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Serenella Leoni in the
Piazza Anfiteatro in Lucca, Italy

The people in the small town of Lucca in Tuscany and the Italian press are going crazy; they have been featured in Forbes Magazine, as the second best European city in which to reside (and number one in Italy).

Of course, the people of Lucca have always thought their city was the best in Italy and now it has been confirmed by an official source. First place on the Forbes list goes to the small island of Patmos in the Aegean Sea (aka the “Holy Greek Island of Patmos”). Third place in the Forbes  ranking is Saignon, a peaceful little village on a cliff in Provence, Southern France.

Below are excerpts from the Forbes article:

“To create our list of the most idyllic places to live in Europe, we asked a panel of experts in the fields of travel and relocation to choose their five favorite simple, unspoiled and near-heavenly locations to take up residence. Many of them will seem unfamiliar because they have yet to be pounced on by hurried, mass-market tourism…

Following Patmos at a close second on our list is Lucca, a medieval city within a city in the region of Tuscany, central Italy. It has "all the Tuscan charm of its neighbors Pisa and Tuscany but without the crowds," says Gillian Pearsall, marketing manager at Intrepid Travel. Tour busses are not the norm here: It's "blissfully cut off by its perfectly preserved Renaissance walls," says Schultz.

"This is a quiet, though classy town, with lawyers and housewives peddling the narrow cobblestone streets past thousand-year-old churches and made-in-Italy fashion boutiques," she says, adding that you can visit the outdoor antiques market every month to furnish your Tuscan farmhouse. The larger city of Florence is just 45 miles to the east; both the beach and skiing in Abetone are about an hour away, in opposite directions. Foreigners who buy into the area tend to be professionals from Britain or other parts of Europe, and some of the most sought-after properties are within the walls of the medieval city.

An apartment in the epicenter can set you back between 300,000 and 500,000 euros ($428,700 and $714,320), depending on how much restoration needs to be done. It's difficult to find a house there, so a good entry point is to find a property within the walled city for the winter, where you could be sheltered from the cold and not worry about electricity outages. Though if you can find it, a house in the hills just outside the city for the spring and summer would be appealing, but prices range from 500,000 to 800,000 euros ($714,320 to $1.1 million).

Vincent suggests avoiding properties that are being sold by a wave of Brits who invested in the area in the '70s and '80s, and who are now seeking to cash in with high asking prices. A better bet would be a local who is selling an inherited house and isn't as desperate to create a nest egg for retirement.

Third place in our ranking is Saignon, a peaceful little village on a cliff in Provence, Southern France. A cluster of honey-colored houses interspersed with many flowers, it's one of the most attractive Provencal villages, according to Lucy White, editor of European titles for Rough Guides.

Life there is "tranquil and sleepy," she says, and because it's such a small village, the community is very tight-knit. It's "a lovely place to make good friends, and not just French. There's quite a large expat community in this part of Provence." The population is just over 1,000.

Saignon, being so small, has few properties for sale, but look hard enough and you can find them. Currently a five-bedroom, 17th-century village house with a courtyard is going for 550,000 euros ($785,870), while a nine-bedroom, seven-bathroom house with a large garden in the village will set you back 1.4 million euros ($2 million).

No one ever said tranquility didn't come with a price.”

See also: “A dog’s life in Lucca, Italy”

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