This Village Is Made Up Of 500 Abandoned Disney-Style Castles

A bizarre ghost town made up of abandoned Disneyland-style castles exists in Turkey. You can check out a clip of it here:

Burj Al Babas, located near Mudurnu, was designed to be a luxury development of 732 three-storey villas costing $200 million (£148,959,000).

All the properties were designed with a very distinctive look featuring Gothic turrets, sweeping balconies and large windows.

Developers Sarot Group, which was behind the project, hoped wealthy Gulf tourists would snap up the units as holiday homes.

Alamy

As well as the unusual residential properties, the Sarot Group also wanted to build a central complex which would feature a cinema, shopping centre, a health spa, sports facilities and various other amenities.

Construction kicked off in 2014 with the luxury homes on sale for between $370,000 (£275,574) and $530,000 (£394,741) - and it got off to a flying start with around half of the properties selling in advance.

The team behind the project initially said it would be completed in around four years.

However, by 2018 sales started to drop and the developers behind the complex were declared bankrupt before it had been completed, meaning that around 530 partially built homes are now left on the land.

Speaking in 2018, Mehmet Emin Yerdelen, chairman of Sarot Group, said the collapse of the project was due to people refusing to pay up for the homes they'd bought.

Sarot Group

He told Hurriyet Daily News: "We couldn't get about $7.5 million (£5,585,662) receivables for the villas we have sold to Gulf countries.

"We applied for bankruptcy protection but the court ruled for bankruptcy. We will appeal the ruling."

And he seemed hopeful that the bankruptcy wasn't the end of the complex, adding: "The total value of the project is about $200 million.

"We still have 250 villas completed and ready to go on sale. Selling only 100 of them would be enough to pay off the debts and complete the project.

Alamy

"We think that we will overcome the crisis in four or five months. We have been planning to open the premises partly in 2019."

Unfortunately for him, that plan didn't come to fruition and the project remains abandoned.

Today the area has become a bit of an attraction in its own right, with visitors keen to take a look around the abandoned village.

Topics: World News, Interesting, Weird

Claire Reid

Claire is a journalist at LADbible who, after dossing around for a few years, went to Liverpool John Moores University. She graduated with a degree in Journalism and a whole load of debt. When not writing words in exchange for money she is usually at home watching serial killer documentaries surrounded by cats. You can contact Claire at [email protected]

@ClaireReid19