Class A but affordable houses: the cost-absorbing model in Rome

Affordable market prices despite being in class A, thanks to a proprietary construction method that cuts costs without passing them on to the buyer; differentiated purchase formulas according to income bracket; flexibility in cuts and sizes; a rent-to-value solution for those who want to raise quality and are unable to afford it all in one go.

Città Verde, the residential development project that La Leva (a company with more than 60 years of experience in the sector, active in the entire real estate development sector) is building in Rome, in the Colle Ardeatino district, is looking for a way to meet the housing demand of young couples, families and self-employed seniors in one of the capital's fastest growing quadrants.

"Our goal is to demonstrate that sustainability and affordability are not contradictory," says Alessandro Guglielmi, architect at La Leva and founder of Città Verde. "We have chosen to absorb the additional costs associated with advanced technologies internally because we believe that the right to a quality home should not be a privilege. Città Verde was created for those who want to live well, at a fair price".

The development covers an area of 41 hectares between Margaret Mead, Linda Malnati and Giovanni Kobler Streets and is divided into four subdivisions with a total of 880 residential units planned today, while the Master Plan allows for a total of approximately 1,000 dwellings. The first two - Comfort District, four five-storey buildings for 265 flats, and Smart District, seven five-storey buildings for 287 flats - are fully completed and sold: the last Smart District flat was sold last week. The third subdivision, Urban District, consists of five buildings - three towers and two side developments - for 165 flats in total, with a 4,500-square-metre commercial plate on the ground floor uniting the entire subdivision. The two side developments are still under construction. The fourth development, Felicity, which is new and will be presented to the market tomorrow, comprises seven three-storey buildings with a total of 163 flats, with delivery scheduled for July 2028. The entire project, started around 2015, is part of an urban redevelopment plan agreed with Roma Capitale, which has made it possible to provide an area historically lacking in services with a network of 20 hectares of parks and equipped green areas, in continuity with the EUR district.

On the price side, Urban District offers two levels of access. It starts at 245,000 euro for a two-room comfort apartment of 67 commercial square metres, approximately 3,650 euro per square metre; for two-room apartments of a smaller size, the price drops even further, placing it in an even more affordable bracket, to the point that it has already recorded a 60% option rate in six months, with the building site still open.
A positioning that compares favourably with current quotations in the Ardeatino-Montagnola axis: according to the most recent surveys of the main real estate portals, residential values in the area range between 3,700 and 4,000 euro per square metre. For example, Idealista reports an average of around €3,725 per square metre in the Ardeatino-Appio Pignatelli-Cecchignola area, while Immobiliare.it goes up to €3,934 per square metre in the Appia Pignatelli-Ardeatino-Montagnola macrozone. For Urban District, La Leva has also introduced a pre-launch list reserved for the first twenty purchasers, aligned with the prices of three years ago, in the face of today's significantly higher construction costs, with delivery expected by March 2027.