June 23, 2020 - Welcome to Balkan Blackmail, and why one of Hvar's best advertisements to the Scandinavian market will be closed this summer, perhaps forever. Bravo, Majstori!
It is one of the great hidden gems of Hvar that few people on the island even know about.
And yet, in certain sports around the world, it is internationally famous. Meet Lost Villa, idyllically located in an isolated waterfront plot in a bay south of Gdinj on eastern Hvar.
In the words of Swedish owner, Per:
We have a fitness villa and bring mostly Swedish crossfit and weightlifters to work out in the sun and enjoy Croatia! We have had some of the world's best athletes in these sports, and in Sweden, we are very famous with our destination.
A fabulous spot, a great business, and a wonderful promotion of the island of Hvar.
But, as Per said, all bookings this year (and there were many) have been cancelled. Not because of corona, but because of Balkan Blackmail.
Because of greed.
I have heard of many real estate horror stories of foreign purchases (as well as many success stories) during my time in Croatia, but few have been such a clinical example of Balkan blackmail as this one. I had my own real estate business, Hvar Property Services, many years ago, an experience which aged me and from which I am still not completely free some 16 years later. But let's focus on Per's story.
She then built a wall blocking the road.
We removed this wall by hand.
Another time the same year she ordered a big truck with huge rocks, however we were able to stop this truck on the way to our villa and he turned around and drove away.
For us it is very clear that she is blackmailing us. She knows the legal process to open up the road is very slow, and during this time she is pushing our limits. And now with corona we can't even go to Croatia to do anything about the big walls she has built blocking our house. We have guests booked for our house this summer, we can't ask them to climb big walls in order to get to the house.
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