A British family “escaped” the UK for Bulgaria for their “dream” home and are now living mortgage free after buying an abandoned house for just £7k.
Laura Phoenix, 33, and her husband Anthony, 32, moved 1,941 miles to Strazhitsa, Bulgaria, in September 2023 with their daughters – Cecelia, four, and Nova, two.
The couple wanted to live off-grid to be sustainable after seeing the state of plastic waste on beaches in Thailand.
But Laura and Anthony, a stay at home dad, couldn’t afford a rural home in the UK and decided to look in Bulgaria for their dream place – after seeing others do the same on YouTube.
The couple found and bought an abandoned three-bedroom property in Strazhitsa for £7,000.
They sold their UK two bedroom home for £85k and moved from Darlington, County Durham to Bulgaria in September 2023 and have been renovating the property ever since.
Since moving Laura says her skin condition has vanished and the family feel “free”.
Laura, an online English teacher and writer, said: “We bought a home on a whim.
“But it’s our dream home. We don’t have any mortgage.
“I developed a skin condition and had bad flare ups.
“When I got here it just vanished.
“I feel we were pushed out of the UK.
“I feel like we had no choice.
“We don’t want to both work hours for 40 hours a week just to exist.
“In England it is so unattainable.”
Anthony said: “Even if you own a property in the UK the cost of living is so much higher.
“We’ve always decided when we want to do something we jump at the opportunity.”
Laura and Anthony had always had a love for travelling but were devastated when they saw the state of the beaches in Thailand.
Laura said: “There was too much plastic everywhere.”
They came back to the UK and set up an eco-friendly and refillable shop in 2018 and managed to buy a fixer upper old council house for £55k.
But the pair had a dream to live off-grid together with their kids but after seeing prices around £500k for what they wanted they started to look abroad.
Laura said: “We were trying to find land for an affordable price.
“We were binge watching YouTube and dreaming of somewhere we could be free.”
After seeing other Brits move to Bulgaria, the couple set their sights on doing the same and spent two weeks finding their family home in May 2022 – falling in love with the town of Strazhitsa, Bulgaria.
They sold their business and Darlington home to buy their Bulgarian dream outright and moved in September 2023.
Laura said: “The garden had a whole mattress in it.
“Anthony demolished the top floor.
“We removed all the rats and vermin.”
The family are currently living in one side of the house with a temporary kitchen while they wait for the harsh winter to pass to continue renovating.
They have spent less that £2k so far and hope to be have it completed in the next three years.
The couple have a quarter of an acre where they have already started to plant seeds to grow spinach, onion, and garlic.
Laura Phoenix, 33, and her husband Anthony, 32, moved 1,941 miles to Strazhitsa, Bulgaria, in September 2023 with their daughters – Cecelia, four, and Nova, two.
The couple wanted to live off-grid to be sustainable after seeing the state of plastic waste on beaches in Thailand.
But Laura and Anthony, a stay at home dad, couldn’t afford a rural home in the UK and decided to look in Bulgaria for their dream place – after seeing others do the same on YouTube.
The couple found and bought an abandoned three-bedroom property in Strazhitsa for £7,000.
They sold their UK two bedroom home for £85k and moved from Darlington, County Durham to Bulgaria in September 2023 and have been renovating the property ever since.
Since moving Laura says her skin condition has vanished and the family feel “free”.
Laura, an online English teacher and writer, said: “We bought a home on a whim.
“But it’s our dream home. We don’t have any mortgage.
“I developed a skin condition and had bad flare ups.
“When I got here it just vanished.
“I feel we were pushed out of the UK.
“I feel like we had no choice.
“We don’t want to both work hours for 40 hours a week just to exist.
“In England it is so unattainable.”
Anthony said: “Even if you own a property in the UK the cost of living is so much higher.
“We’ve always decided when we want to do something we jump at the opportunity.”
Laura and Anthony had always had a love for travelling but were devastated when they saw the state of the beaches in Thailand.
Laura said: “There was too much plastic everywhere.”
They came back to the UK and set up an eco-friendly and refillable shop in 2018 and managed to buy a fixer upper old council house for £55k.
But the pair had a dream to live off-grid together with their kids but after seeing prices around £500k for what they wanted they started to look abroad.
Laura said: “We were trying to find land for an affordable price.
“We were binge watching YouTube and dreaming of somewhere we could be free.”
After seeing other Brits move to Bulgaria, the couple set their sights on doing the same and spent two weeks finding their family home in May 2022 – falling in love with the town of Strazhitsa, Bulgaria.
They sold their business and Darlington home to buy their Bulgarian dream outright and moved in September 2023.
Laura said: “The garden had a whole mattress in it.
“Anthony demolished the top floor.
“We removed all the rats and vermin.”
The family are currently living in one side of the house with a temporary kitchen while they wait for the harsh winter to pass to continue renovating.
They have spent less that £2k so far and hope to be have it completed in the next three years.
The couple have a quarter of an acre where they have already started to plant seeds to grow spinach, onion, and garlic.
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FunTranscript
00:00 Welcome to Bulgaria, a rural paradise that many people are choosing to call home,
00:05 to escape the rat race and return to simple, stress-free living.
00:09 We chose to move to this small village in Bulgaria for its culture,
00:16 history, friendly people and of course the opportunity to buy a property.
00:20 This property has half an acre of land with a gorgeous house and an abundance of fruit trees.
00:29 We have lots of space to grow our own food and plenty of space for our girls to play.
00:34 Can you believe that we bought this property for just over £7,000?
00:40 Take a sneaky peek at the first stages of our renovation with our bedrooms and their transformation.
01:07 We spent a long time removing all of the previous owner's belongings, dust, dirt and plenty of dead rats also.
01:14 We were really desperate to get into the house, get the bedroom sorted because we'd been living in our campervan and travelling for the past seven months.
01:27 [Music]
01:28 [Music]
01:31 [Music]
01:34 [Music]
01:38 [Music]
01:41 [Music]
01:51 [Music]
02:01 [Music]
02:04 [Music]
02:14 [Music]
02:24 [Music]
02:28 If you're sick of the cost of living in the UK then listen to this. Living in Bulgaria is 61%
02:39 cheaper than living in the UK. It is £2,700 per month for a family to live in the UK.
02:47 In Bulgaria we spend on average around £110 per month on our bills and we've just paid
02:54 £270 for two cubic meters of wood to last us. Fuel and our telephone are all very low as well.
03:02 Obviously I am not glorifying the fact that Bulgaria is kind of a tough place to live if
03:09 you're not fit and able. There are lots of things that you need to do, lots of walking, supermarkets
03:14 and shops are quite far away but overall we have found that it is much cheaper to live here and thus
03:22 means we are so much happier and less stressed about money.