After months of viewing, comparing and periodizing properties online, we wanted to see some properties in person.
If you want to find real estate on Lake Maggiore, you can’t avoid a personal viewing tour.
We took a week for our local property search and made 8 appointments with estate agents.
To keep an overview, I took screenshots of the individual properties and Google Maps on my tablet and added the name of the contact person and their cell phone number.
I saved the whole thing in the order of the appointments so that I always had everything in front of my eyes and could navigate my loved one to their destination (almost) without getting lost.

On the price level: in the past, people spoke of the lean (Lombardy) and the fat (Piedmont) side of Lake Maggiore.
Even today, there are still more stately villas and grand hotels on the western shoreline than on the opposite side.
This is where the rich and noble from Milan, Switzerland and Germany spent their vacations in the last and penultimate centuries.
Of course, the eastern bank also offers grandiose residences, but it was traditionally less crowded.
Of course, no two properties are the same and a direct price comparison between the two sides is difficult.
However, we did not have the impression that the price level of the two sides differed greatly.
For comparable properties, the prices were also similar.

Only now, with hindsight, do I have to say that the surroundings or the nearest town to the property in question are at least as important as the property itself.
We viewed a property in Tuscany – not knowing at the time that the region around Lake Maggiore was what we were looking for in terms of scenery – which was absolutely immaculate and would have suited us perfectly.
Fortunately, we were in the area a few hours before the viewing appointment and drove around a bit.
No, we absolutely did not want to live in this region.
The landscape was very beautiful, but we just didn’t like the towns, shopping and restaurants.

And so we decided for our little house in the mountains, above a lovely village. But here, too, we underestimated how much a place changes over the seasons: We visited the place for the first time in November: Everything was very quiet, some stores and restaurants closed for the winter, the shutters down and despite the good weather, there were only a few people out and about, apparently locals, few tourists. Just our thing! In August, however, when the Milanese are on vacation and populate their houses by the lake, when there is an event almost every weekend down in the village, when you can only get into your favorite pizzeria in the evening with a reservation, it’s too lively for us and so we spend the height of summer in Germany.

You should definitely take a look at the traffic conditions in summer.
Roads that seem idyllic and quiet outside the main season can mutate into motorcycle race tracks in the height of summer.

You can find out what happens once you have found your dream property here: