Blog on buying property in Crete, Greece

In one of his short stories (published in the newspaper “Estia” at the beginning of the 20th century) under the title “Not for Rent”, Georgios Drosinis with his writing skill narrates a dormant love, which is rekindled. The young protagonist, after years of absence from Athens, returns, looking for a room to rent. Behind the “For Rent” sign, which looks like a “large patch” that is stuck on a front door of Akadimias street, he discovers with surprise that it is not just any landlady but his old unforgettable love.

“…On the front door was stuck as a white large patch a printed “For Rent” sign…”

Drosinis is also the representative of a gifted generation of writers, which comes from the end of the previous century and the dawn of the 20th, bringing valuable information about the morals, the habits, the social relations and the everyday life of ages that have passed. With their work, Theotokas, Myrivilis, Kastanakis, Politis, Karagatsis, Terzakis and so many others, especially of this generation, will experience the transformation of Greek society, which will take place in the transition from the century of oppression to the next, of independence. Their heroes will be in physical spaces, they will “photograph” them, they will become the chroniclers of their time and with their great talent they will create a collection of information, a legacy for the future. Many of them will come from their birthplaces to Athens for studies, will stay in miserable rented rooms and will create culture in them.

In the 1940s, Greece experienced a period, during which it did not have time to heal the wounds caused by the displacement of its population from Asia Minor, frequent changes of government, military coups, political instability, a dictatorship… Athens is the capital with the complexities of a growing population and a limited number of accommodations that cannot serve it.

In 1928, the country’s population numbered 6,204,684 people, of which 392,781 were living in the capital. Within eight years, the city’s inhabitants had increased by more than 100,000 (in 1920, Athens had 292,991 inhabitants of a total population of 5,536,375)! This is not surprising due to the wave of refugees that had come after the Asia Minor disaster but also because of the rural-to-urban migration, which had already begun to emerge. The census of 1940 shows a permanent population of 487,045 inhabitants in Athens, but reconstruction is an expensive affair for the lower social classes and the times were not favorable. Some refugee houses are the last examples of construction activity in urban centers.

Hotel costs are high and certainly not suitable for long-term stays. But for the housing of provincials and low-income foreigners some scattered rooms are available in the capital. Several owners of hovels, for a supplemental (sometimes also the only one) monthly income, choose to squeeze into one or at most two rooms of their house with their families and to rent the third. The revenues are clear, there are no receipts and certainly no obligations to the state, which, after all, has no housing policy to apply for the needs of the ever-growing population, in this way covers up its insufficiency and turns a blind eye. Therefore, it serves everyone and does not bother anyone… The country, anyway, for a century is completely familiar with Airbnb.

Airbnb? Old… Sweet Grapes

In 1834, when Athens was declared the capital of the Greek state, it had 1,560 houses and 7,000 inhabitants, some of whom, not having a place to stay, were settled in half-demolished buildings, which they slowly rebuilt. Greece, a former Ottoman possession, had nothing to offer other than several examples of its distant, glorious ancient past and more remnants of its gloomy recent past, among which several inns in the entire Greek territory at that time, which were the only choice for travelers looking for accommodation. The French academic and journalist Edmond About, a visitor to Athens in those years, called the inns of the city “resthouses”, where later several ministers of the first governments will be hosted and will pay for their accommodation.

But, of course, the short-term stay is one thing, for which there is a relative sufficiency for the time and another thing the rooms for long-term stay, which are clearly in short supply. The shortage becomes more apparent when, from the 1850s onwards, there is a significant influx of travelers from Western Europe, diplomats of the great powers, scholarship holders of foreign archaeological schools and simple lovers of antiquity, who dream of personal acquaintance with the homeland of Plato and Aristotle. They want to see the Greek countryside but mainly Athens, the famous Acropolis, the temple of Hephaestus and so many other wonders that they have encountered in their books. Usually their stay in Greece is long, like their journey to get here. Before they came they already knew that facilities for long-term stay do not exist in the recently liberated country. In Athens, where after all the travelers stay, they usually manage to have a bed in the inns of the city and in two or three two-story houses, which have been called hotels. Diplomats are usually accommodated in residences of other European officials, heads of archaeological expeditions or even in mansions – often for a fee – of aristocratic families. In these houses, they enjoy the greek hospitality and socialize with the hosts. Sometimes they fall in love with their daughters. D.Kambouroglou and Philadelpheus in their monumental works on the history of Athens record several stories of foreign visitors, who in this way met and married Greek women and stayed in Greece. After all, this was something that the housewives apparently also wanted, as they wished to marry their daughters to the tenant-catch…

“We’re living a disorderly life here. The game is in its prime. The old woman, Teresa’s mother, is foolish enough to imagine that I would take her daughter to be my lawful wife…” the poet Lord Byron will write to his friend Hobhouse in England in a not at all… flattering display of his romance, from the house of the Makri family in Athens where he is staying. There, he has fallen in love with the 13-year-old daughter of the owners but – as he states – he does not intend to marry her. Despite this, the English lover will compose the famous poem “Maid of Athens” for the young Greek woman…

This is how Greece launched Airbnb from the 19th century, creating new social and economic conditions. At this time, the daily rental price for a room in a mansion does not only cover the cost of accommodation for eating, drinking and cleaning, which are provided by the owner. It also reflects the economic status of the tenant. To be precise, the amount of money for accommodation is primarily a matter of prestige, which very conveniently also provides an income for the landlord. After all, for suffering Greece, any income is welcome and also the tax office does not yet exist.

“…Six – seven shabby rooms, in a row, all very old, hovels, others without windows, all with almost flimsy walls… There were two or three bachelors, a family with five or six children, a divorcee, Katerinio the Constantinopolitan, a wage earner, living seemingly all alone; and the inner room at the back of the yard was occupied by the landlady, Mrs. Giannena, a widow with her daughter Dimitroula…”
- Alexandros Papadiamantis

The “saint of Greek letters” in his short story “The neighbor with laouto” describes his poorly lit room in a courtyard of Aristofanous Street in Psiri. “The roof of the small room consisted of the first floor of the upper house that was occupied by officers, university students etc. and part of the stone-paved room on the housetop or rather the high built passageway, through which someone could enter the courtyard”, he says. It’s here, in this rented room where he writes “The Gypsy Girl.”

The 19th century is not over yet. It is in its late years. Psiri and Neapoli (Exarchia) are neighborhoods that attract new strangers. Papadiamantis finds his inspiration in the first one. Palamas, again, prefers the second. In “Scattered Pages of my Life” Drosinis reveals that one of the provincials who came at the end of the 19th century in Athens is Kostis Palamas, who takes a room in a house on Solonos Street, right behind the Municipal Hospital (today’s City of Athens cultural center). “This house was old, two-story, with a large yard and a narrow wooden staircase, which was leading to the upper floor. Downstairs was living the housewife with her two daughters and she was renting the upstairs to university students, which was convenient for them because the university was nearby. The upstairs was divided into two quite large rooms: from one they were passing to the other. In each room two old iron beds with straw mattresses and a red pillow without a pillow case. Sheets and covers were brought by whoever was renting the room…” describes Drosinis in detail, not forgetting to mention the love affairs of the landlady’s daughters with the tenants, with whom -as he says- “they often made trips to the verdant and full of pine trees Lycabettus”, where several university students were going up to light a candle in Saint George’s chapel “to help them in the exams”.

The… idyllic relationship between tenant and landlady…

Airbnb will “exist” through the ages, it will be organized and established until the middle of the 20th century, when the rent of rooms -at first by the day and then by the month- will be a great success, the tax office will be absent. However, its social contribution will remain and expand beyond encounters and marriages… The civil servant, who will be transferred far from his hometown, the military man, who will be called to serve in another city, the adventurer, who will seek the opportunity of his life, the university student who will be away from his mother’s care in order to make his dream come true. But also the artist and the lonely person or the other, the intellectual man.

At the turn of the century and in the first half of the 20th, the chroniclers convey an image that despite all the deprivations of the time, today in the noisy and contaminated environment of the city, it seems idyllic… “The apartment buildings in each neighborhood were very few. The most houses were one-story and two-story. They had vines and sweet acacias in their yards… The roads were not all paved with asphalt. There were openings everywhere, free spaces” describes Giannis Kairofylas.

“Sometimes two or more families lived together in the same yard with a shared toilet” adds Zoi Ropatiou-Tsapareli in her own description.

In these houses with the courtyards and the sweet acacias you will find newly arrived families from the provinces and young people, although most of the latter, because they are university students, consistently prefer the rooms in the heart of Athens, within a short distance from the University. Each yard has at least one room. In order to increase the price, it is usually freshly whitewashed. It has a single bed, a single wardrobe and a table with a chair. Water from the washstand during the winter and the tap in the yard during the summer. As for WC, in the shared toilet of the outdoor space. The price in the 1950s reaches about 10 drachmas per day, depending on the amenities.

As the capital, as the great urban center of the country, Athens of the 1950s and 1960s (its population has exceeded half a million) is a place of great demand and even greater supply. The well-built refugee homes have become more numerous. They were built by people from Asia Minor under their own management, who were already established and prosperous. The country has roughly healed the wounds of the civil war and is embarking on a new journey, which opens new horizons. The residential growth that was bogged down until then, starts again, but the “For Rent” signs – “patches” will take a long time to come off the front doors.

Sources:

• History of Athenians, Academic D. Kambouroglou (Pub. PALMOS – Athens, 1995)
• History of Athens during the Ottoman Era, Th. Philadelpheos (Pub. G. Bart / K. Eleftheroudakis – Athens, 1902)
• George Drosinis / Introduction and Selection of Texts, F.P. Logothetis (Society for the Promotion of Useful Books – Athens, 1960)
• Social Housing Policy in Greece: The Dimensions of an Absence, D. Emmanouil (Social Research Review 120, Athens, 2006)
• What is History Looking for in Cinema, M. Stasinopoulou (Histories Magazine, Pub. MELISSA, vol. 12th, 1995)
• Remember Those Years…, G. Kairofylas (Pub. Filippoti – Athens, 2009)
• Psyri, the Neighborhood of Heroes, Art. Skoumpourdi (Pub. Pataki – Athens, 2021)
• Rouf-Votanikos-Gazochori, Z. Ropaitou-Tsapareli (Pub. Filippoti – Athens, 2004)
• Athens Today, N. Tsiforos (Pub. HERMES – Athens, 2009)
• Athens – Tracing the City Through History and Literature, Th. Giochalas / T. Kafetzaki (Pub. Estia – Athens, 2021)
• The Beautiful Neapolis and the Misunderstood Exarchia, G. Kairofylas (Pub. Filippoti – Athens, 2002)
• Othonian Greece, Ed. About (Pub. Metaixmio – 2018)
• Metaxourgio – Kolonos, V. Angelidis (Pub. Filippoti – 1992)

- TONIA A. MANIATEA / ANA-MPA -

The article was published in the newspaper “Chaniotika Nea” on May 1, 2023, issue number 16953