THE BUILDING BOOM

When the war ended in 1999, close to 30% of Kosovo’s housing stock was destroyed or damaged, and the country has been building like crazy ever since. One of the things that we immediately noticed when we arrived in Kosovo was the vast vista of partially-constructed houses. Concrete cores with sticks of rebar poking out; brick shells with empty eyes for windows; triple-deckers with one floor lived in and two floors temporarily used for hanging the washing or storing construction materials… the endless array of unfinished homes is a visual indicator that houses in Kosovo have traditionally been built little by little, as the owners can pay for them. Here – as in many poor countries - cash is king, and you pay as you go.

Unfortunately, there appears to be little oversight to the way that buildings go up. Orange and yellow ten-story buildings will suddenly fill a lot, butting right up against modest one-story homes. Bright modern stores glazed in showy rounded glass rise next to a socialist-era apartment building and an Ottoman-style house. Many Kosovars complaint not only about this visual anarchy but also about another striking fact: zoning laws, planning commissions, organized coordination with electric or sewage companies, safety laws for construction sites – all are either non-existent or rarely enforced. Already complicated by the falling Yugoslav government’s transition to free-market capitalism in the 1990s and the Serbian state’s attempt to bolster the Kosovar Serb population by selling previously public land to Serbs for very little money, property issues became even more contentious after the war, as properties were destroyed or abandoned and massive migrations occurred. Land disputes are common, and urban planners have found that trying to gain control for their municipality is a challenge. Most famous is the case of Rexhep Luci, Pristina’s leading urban planner, who announced his opposition to the problem of illegal construction in the fall of 2000. After documenting over 2,000 cases, Luxi issued his first three decisions ordering the demolition of the most blatant of illegal structures, including a restaurant built in the middle of a public park. Soon after, Luci was shot dead, and the murder has not been solved.

Now - for those Kosovars who not only have the desire to live in an organized environment but the means to afford it – there’s International Village: the country’s first American-style gated community. Located just five minutes away from downtown Pristina, it bills itself as an oasis in an increasingly congested and chaotic urban landscape. The development offers its own waste-treatment processing, a paid security force, self-sufficient geo-thermal heating in each home, fixtures and finishings imported from the US and Europe, community features such as a pool, gym and clubhouse, and a board that decides upon community standards. Funded by international investors, it also offers potential residents the first mortgage opportunities ever in Kosovo – a big deal for a traditionally cash-based country. International Village is also the city’s first properly deeded and registered development in the city. Recently, International Village’s Bekim Tahiri showed us around the place and told us about the company’s plans. But with a mortgage crisis in the rest of the world, will Kosovo embrace the new opportunity to buy houses on loan? Is this new deeded, registered landscape a harbinger of things to come for Kosovo municipalities? And with price tags starting at over 300,000 Euros in a country where the average income is $1800, who will buy here? The progress of International Village and the people who move in should offer valuable insight not only into Kosovo’s changing economy but also into the opportunity for developers to make an impact on the country’s urban planning.