Couple who 'escaped' the UK for their 'dream' home in Bulgaria now live mortgage free after buying an abandoned house for just £7,000 and fixing it up themselves

 

          

Laura Phoenix, 33, and her husband Anthony, 32, moved 1,941 miles from Darlington, County Durham, 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 father, 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 after selling their two-bedroom house in the UK for £85,000.