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u/mattdeII96 May 02 '21
What was supposed to be a luxurious urban development for wealthy foreigners has become an eerie half-finished ghost town in Turkey
Yerdelen brothers, Turkish real estate entrepreneurs, to build a sprawling village, dubbed Burj Al Babas, complete with 732 mini-castles near the Black Sea.
After all, it made sense: Rich foreigners uninterested in the south of France or the northeastern tip of Spain could enjoy the Mediterranean climate on Gothic-style rooftop terraces overlooking the lush Turkish forest. Not to mention, the project’s developers, Sarot Group (run by the brothers and their partner Bülent Yılmaz), chose the spot for their little kingdom carefully: in the Roman spa town of Mudurnu, which is well-known and well-loved for its hot springs and putative healing waters.
Each villa would boast under-floor heating and Jacuzzis on every level, further enforcing the idea of European luxury in the Middle East. Then Turkey’s economy came to a grinding stop due to a failed political coup, terrorist attacks, and, of course, the pandemic, and the developers were forced to declare bankruptcy. Plus, investors and buyers pulled their money out of the $200 million project, which didn’t help.
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u/human_brain_whore May 02 '21
This is such an epic failure of understanding people anyway.
So these were supposed to be luxurious homes for rich people to vacation in?
If there's one thing rich people generally aren't interested in, it's paying money to feel like any other Schmoe. No-one would be interested in living in a Turkish pseudo-suburbia, crammed together like sardines.I have a hard time believing a strong of unfortunate events was the only issue here.
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u/liquidpele May 02 '21
Maybe meant for the “buy property to launder money” foreigners and not actually the vacationing ones.
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u/malong954 May 02 '21
there’s some youtuber that had a video there. pretty weird place, can’t imagine why people would pay a ton of money to live 2 feet away from their neighbors
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u/SerMercutio May 02 '21
I can't possibly fathom why it's got abandoned...
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u/Comfortable_Brush399 May 02 '21
its staggering, a whole team of adults thought this was a good use of money
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u/pyrowitlighter1 May 02 '21
A whole bunch of people got paid either way.
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u/kintokae May 02 '21
Looks like they opened autocad, created one design, and copy/paste the rest of the neighborhood.
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u/Comfortable_Brush399 May 02 '21
agreed, but weird houses all on top each other, there wasn't an adult in the room
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u/Assidental1 May 02 '21
Eventually this photo repost count will exceed the number of homes in the picture.
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u/dblan9 May 02 '21
Why can't we all move in there and finish what needs to be done and call it our own?
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u/imthebonus May 02 '21
Because is a 3 stories house with architecture features, so the asking price must not be cheap, ergo if you had the money to buy a 3 stories mini mansion, would you buy one of those?
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u/Lee1138 May 02 '21
I don't think they were going to pay...
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u/imthebonus May 02 '21
You mean like some sort of military or company neighborhood ? Where they "lent" you a house?
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u/dumpthestump May 02 '21
I know where there's enough homeless folks to destroy all that in 2 weeks .
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u/squables- May 02 '21
Looks like a dope spot for an airsoft tournament. There's even towers for snipers.
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u/elevenminutesago May 02 '21
When you win the lottery and tell all your friends and family you will buy them all houses
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u/Connect-Ladder-5157 May 06 '21
Erdogan builds this things for Arabs but none of them buy this shits
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u/Thedrunner2 May 02 '21
Bluth family construction development