A couple moved to Italy and bought a farm

Davidson told Business Insider that they want a better quality of life and a cheaper cost of living, but warmer weather than in the UK.

They wanted flexibility in their careers

O’Shea said he could afford to buy property in the Italian countryside without taking out a mortgage. “In academia it’s not a very stable career. You’re definitely not well paid,” he said. They wanted to buy a property instead of taking out a mortgage to give them more freedom in their careers.

Looking for property in Italy, the couple settled on the Marche, a region on the east coast, because it was more affordable than other areas they considered.

In May 2021, they found a farm on the market for 200,000 euros, or around $218,000. O’Shea told BI they fell in love with the 44-hectare farm, which had an olive grove and dilapidated farmhouse, as soon as they saw it.

The farm had been on the market for 30 years, which helped the couple’s offer drop its price by €60,000. They had €80,000 in savings and covered the rest by selling their caravan and taking a loan from O’Shea’s parents.

They bought the farm, including the farm, for 140,000 euros, or around $154,000, in October 2021, according to documents seen by BI. O’Shea and Davidson moved to Italy shortly after.

They work on the farm alongside academia

The couple were recently approved for a €328,000 grant to support young farmers and plan to spend €250,000 to replace the farm, which they said was structurally unsound.

While they await planning permission to replace the farmhouse, the couple told BI they are renting a nearby property for €300 a month. They split their time between tutoring and farm work and said they work seven days a week most weeks.

O’Shea, who completed his Ph.D. in 2022, spend one to two hours a day tutoring UK students remotely in the morning. He earns around £1,500, which is about $1,900 a month from tutoring. Davidson told BI that they now spend much less on food and bills than they did in the UK.

After the tutorial, he told BI that he spends six to eight hours a day growing olive oil from trees and picking lavender to sell. In the first year he drove the oil to Britain to sell it in the markets, but since then they have shipped it.

“I love agriculture,” said O’Shea, “I think it’s a real challenge and it’s something that to me is a really nice overlap with academia.”

Davidson took an agriculture course this year and told BI he enjoys learning how to farm along with finishing his Ph.D. “Making something really hands-on and concrete was so appealing,” she said.

“When work is your own boss and you’re doing what you want to do, then obviously it’s physically and mentally exhausting, but it’s not exhausting in the same way because you’re happy doing it,” she said.

Davidson and O’Shea do not earn enough from their farming business to live on, and O’Shea currently tutors UK students remotely to supplement their income.

They aim to make the products from their farm their main income in a few years and plan to organize tours of the olive groves for tourists in the future.

They have no regrets

The couple told BI that the lifestyle suited them better than working in the UK.

“Everyone I know who lives in London or a big UK city and works in a traditional office job has said that since COVID it’s a lot more unpleasant. It is much more pressing. His financial stress takes joy. of a lot of things,” Davidson said.

She said that although there are not many young people in Marche, they have made friends and feel a strong sense of community.

“I didn’t think, for one day, that I would rather be back in London,” O’Shea said.

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