The country enjoys a mild climate for most of the year, with hot summers on the coast and sun and snow in the mountains. Access is getting easier and cheaper as more tourist operators fly to regional airports. Most charter companies fly direct to coastal and mountain resorts during the tourist season, and it’s likely that budget airlines will begin flights to the country now that it joined the EU.
Part of Bulgaria’s attraction is its status as a relatively unknown country, offering much to discover for those willing to spend the time: quaint rustic villages, elaborate churches and monasteries and spectacular natural scenery. In fact, Bulgaria offers a huge range of leisure and cultural activities.
Although Bulgarians have a reputation for being surly, this owes more to James Bond films than reality. Most Bulgarians will go out of their way to help you and, if you make an effort to learn some Bulgarian, you will be welcomed wherever you choose to buy your home.
All of life’s essentials (and most of the extras) are cheap and, although property prices are rising rapidly, they remain good value by western European (and particularly British) standards. Even if you plan to retire to Bulgaria and life off a foreign pension, you will be able to live well.
Other advantages to buying a home in Bulgaria include strong demand for rental accommodation in the resort towns, low maintenance and building costs, quality fresh food and impressive wines, a relaxed traditional pace of life in rural areas, great hiking and scenery in the interior, and beautiful, clean white sand beaches along the coast.
There are a few disadvantages as well, including communication problems if you don’t speak Bulgarian (and can’t read the Cyrillic alphabet), restrictions on land ownership, lack of flights in the “off” season, poor roads and infrastructure in some areas, overcrowding in popular tourist areas during the summer, and the expense of getting to Bulgaria if you won a holiday home there and don’t live in a nearby country with good air connections.
While much of Bulgaria is pristine forest and mountains, there are pockets of heavy industry, although this largely collapsed in the years following the demise of communism. For example, coal mining is still carried out on a small scale in the Pernik region, which has a legacy of pollution from the mining industry.
You should be especially careful if you’re considering buying property on the Black Sea coast south of Varna or south of Bourgas. Bourgas is home to a large commercial port and an oil refinery, while Varna has a huge port and naval base and the remains of Bulgaria’s shipbuilding industry, both of which can cause pollution.
This article is an extract from Buying a Home in Bulgaria from Survival Books.