House Hunting in … Greece
As the country emerges from a crippling debt crisis, the island of Crete remains popular with second-home buyers….
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A Seaside Villa on the Northern Coast of Crete
$1.3 MILLION (1.2 MILLION EUROS)
This seven-bedroom, four-bathroom home is in Plaka, a fishing village on the northwestern coast of Crete, the largest and most populous of the Greek islands. The property, known as Villa Ioanna, sits on a sloping, 1.23-acre lot near several olive groves and overlooks Souda Bay and the Mediterranean Sea.
Built in 1994 and clad in whitewashed concrete, the 2,690-square-foot, two-story house offers traditional Greek design, with archways throughout. It was originally a two-family home, with communal spaces at street level and bedrooms below. A renovation six years ago reconfigured the upper level into one large, marble-floored entertaining space. The kitchen was enlarged, and the bathrooms were redone.
“We wanted it to be more modern,” said Penelope Vlamaki, the owner’s daughter and the manager of the property, which is frequently rented.
At the end of an asphalt driveway, beyond an arched colonnade, are two separate front doors. One leads past a hall closet and bathroom, through an archway, to the intersection of the dining and living spaces, which connect with the kitchen in the open floor plan. The other leads past a bedroom and a hall bathroom, through another archway, to the living space.