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Augsburg's Fuggerei

TOURING THE WORLD'S OLDEST SOCIAL HOUSING COMPLEX STILL IN USE

| STORY BY SHARON WHITLEY LARSEN |

magine paying only one dollar per today converted to .88 euro cents, or four times the annual rent!) tour the
Iyear in rent! about $1! The rent has stayed the same bucolic grounds of this interesting, his-
over five centuries! toric, walled complex.
That's what some 150 residents are
charged to live at the Fuggerei in Augs- And Fuggerei residents can live here (in The Fuggerei, built between 1514 and
burg, Germany, the world's oldest char- this city of 260,000) indefinitely—with 1523, originally had 52 cottages with
itable social housing complex. It was no rent increase! 106 apartments—“a city within a city.”
established in 1520 by visionary Ja- One of the city’s most popular tour- At one time it also had a school. Today
kob Fugger “The Rich” as low-income ist destinations, the charming, carm- the complex has been expanded to 67
housing for needy Roman Catholics el-colored Fuggerei is a living museum, two-story buildings with 140 apart-
who were required to be upstanding managed by the Fugger Family Council ments, each with private entrances,
citizens--and Augsburg residents for at trust. Some 200,000 annual visitors ranging from 500 to 700 square feet,
least two years. Nearly 500 years ago (who—with the exception of school with a modest sitting room, bedroom,
they were charged one Rhenish gulden, children--each pay 4 euros, more than kitchen,and bathroom. The downstairs

62 Wine Dine & Travel Winter 2015