I have a friend and his wife (no, really!) who are want to move down to Apulia and buy a house as a permanent base for themselves.

Does anyone on the board have any direct experience of doing this, and if so, provide any points that I could pass on - stuff to watch out for (either pitfalls or shortcuts), useful contacts, that sort of thing.

Any useful websites for expats living in Italy (other than this one, of course...).

Puglia is a very large region. Which part? We live here, have been here for over 6 years, and I am sure my good friend Clint will be along soon to add her comments. We are always glad to meet people thinking of coming to our part of Puglia (Brindisi Province).

At the moment they are very open as to where they want to live, but Brindisi seems to be the place that they have mentioned most often. Currently they are staying in Oria, as it is so central.

Oria is down the road from Margaret and I so if your friends would like to meet up for a chat they are not far from us

As Margaret said there are lots of different areas within Puglia, i wouldn't touch the Foggia area (north of the region) and Taranto.

It really depends what your friends are looking for and budget I guess, generally the Lecce are is more expensive than the Brindisi one

We are in Abruzzo and have a fantastically helpful forum called Abruzzolutely.com. You can find all sorts if info on this and if you have any questions - just post..