Salt air drifts up the hillside here, carried on a breeze just strong enough to tousle your hair while you stand under the veranda with a glass of last year’s olive oil in hand. Below you, the rooftops of Santo Stefano di Camastra tumble down toward a shimmering stretch of the Mediterranean, and the view stretches so far you can watch the haze roll in over the water in the afternoon. This is the kind of view that stops you mid sentence, the kind you build a whole lifestyle around.
We toured this property just above town, in the countryside called Compana, and it is easy to picture waking up here. You would step outside with your coffee, walk through a hundred well tended olive trees, pick a few grapes off the vine by the door, and look out at the sea before you have even finished your first sip. That is not a fantasy, that is just a normal morning if you own Casa Mario.
A Fresh Start Above Santo Stefano di Camastra
Santo Stefano di Camastra is a coastal town of about 4,300 people, famous across Sicily for its ceramics. We do our own grocery shopping there three times a week, so we know the rhythm of the place well.
Casa Mario sits in the hills just above it, close enough for regular errands but far enough to feel like your own private world. From up here you are in plain view of the Mediterranean the whole time.
The Story Behind an Unlived-In House
This home was completed around 2004, but the family who built it never actually moved in. Instead they used it as a warehouse for their olive oil business, storing equipment and supplies rather than living there.
That means the structure is essentially new, just dusty and cluttered rather than worn. The windows and doors are already up to current energy efficiency standards, and once you clear the storage items out, you are looking at a home that barely needs anything structural done to it.
The Bedrooms and Bathrooms, Ready to Move In
The first bedroom is finished and move-in ready. You would simply need to clear it out, add furniture, and settle in.
The first bathroom is a generous three-quarter bath with a walk-in shower, fully installed and untouched. The second bathroom is a full bath with a tub, also brand new and never used, just waiting for someone to clean it up and make it their own.
The Kitchen and Living Space, A Blank Canvas
The main living and eating area is huge, with tile floors that are in perfect shape throughout. The kitchen itself is basic for now, adequate to get by on while you plan your own renovation, much like the temporary setup we lived with for five months when we first bought our own property in Pettineo.
One detail worth noting is the back wall, which is built into the hillside and partially subterranean. We checked it closely and it has been sealed extremely well, honestly some of the best sealing work we have seen on a property here.
The Veranda, Where the Sea View Steals the Show
Step through the double doors off the kitchen and you land on a covered veranda measuring 50 square meters (about 540 square feet), already built and just waiting for finishing touches. This space faces the sea and captures the sunset every single evening.
Add a simple wooden pergola, train some wisteria or jasmine up it, throw down some golden gravel, and set out a dining table, and you have got yourself an outdoor room that rivals any restaurant terrace in the region. Mornings here get sun, and by afternoon the space shifts into cool shade, since the veranda faces north.
The Olive Grove and Land, A Working Piece of Sicily
The property sits on 5,000 square meters (about 1.25 acres) of land, and the olive grove practically surrounds the house. The current owner cultivates around a hundred well maintained olive trees, including varieties like Nocellara and Verdello, producing 200 to 250 liters of extra virgin olive oil every year.
That is not a small hobby crop. If you have ever read about the health benefits of a liter of good extra virgin olive oil a week, and we have adopted a similar habit ourselves, this property basically hands you the source material.
Beyond the olives, there are kiwi vines, grapes climbing near the entrance, apricot trees still bearing fruit, and room for a full vegetable garden if farm-to-table living appeals to you. A well on the property produces eight solid hours of running water a day, enough to service both the house and the entire grove.
The land is gated and completely private, so you can walk the grounds without another set of eyes on you, a real rarity this close to a town.
Property Highlights of Casa Mario
- Location: countryside above Santo Stefano di Camastra, Sicily, with sea views over the Mediterranean
- 2 bedrooms, 2 bathrooms, never lived in, used previously as an olive oil warehouse
- Interior size of 100 square meters (about 1,080 square feet)
- 50 square meter (about 540 square foot) covered veranda facing the sea
- Built around 2004, windows and doors meet current energy efficiency standards
- 1.25 acres (5,000 square meters) of land, gated and fully private
- Around 100 olive trees producing 200 to 250 liters of extra virgin olive oil per year
- Kiwi vines, grapes, apricot trees, and space for a vegetable garden
- Private well producing eight hours of water flow daily, serving house and grove
- Watch the full property tour
- Featured in Episode 34
- Asking price: €128,000
Please note: our property tours stay online long after filming, and homes like this tend to sell quickly, so this one may no longer be available. If it has already sold, we can still help you find something similar. Tell us your dream, and we’ll help make it real.
Your Olive Grove Home Awaits Above Santo Stefano
Casa Mario is not a finished, polished villa, and we will not pretend otherwise. What it is, though, is a nearly new structure with all the bones already in place, sitting on a working olive grove, with a sea view that genuinely takes your breath away from the veranda.
If you have vision, and you can look past some clutter and an unfinished kitchen, there is a real opportunity here to walk into a home and a small agricultural business at the same time. Producing your own extra virgin olive oil while looking out at the Mediterranean every evening is not a small thing.
We think properties like this move fast, precisely because so few homes offer working land, privacy, and a coastal view all in one package. If this sounds like the kind of chapter you have been imagining, this hillside above Santo Stefano di Camastra might just be where it starts.
Chaos can be the catalyst for change, and sometimes that change looks exactly like a quiet house on a hill, surrounded by olive trees, with the sea stretched out in front of you.
