A Place In The Sun host Sara Damergi's shares update on 'incredibly stressful' housing project
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Fans used to watching TV’s Sara Damergi find househunters dream homes abroad on A Place in the Sun will be surprised by the location of her own building project. A regular presenter of the Channel 4 show for 12 years, instead of picking a Mediterranean hotspot like the Spanish costas, she is building 55 flats and 14 shops in war-torn Lebanon.
Together with her brothers Aboudi and Malek, she is finishing the project started more than 20 years ago by her Lebanese born father, Issam, who bought back family land for the build, but died from cancer in May 2022, aged 67, before it was completed.
“We are so proud of him and we want to do this, but it’s been very emotional and incredibly stressful,” says Sara, 45. On top of project managing from afar, she has faced an economic crisis and a war - turning her dad’s dream into a nightmare at times.
Concerned about her brothers and her extended family’s safety in the region, Sara says: “I’ve worried about them all the time. You constantly have this background hum of fear. ”. But she and her brothers remain determined to see their dad’s legacy completed on land that was in the family for many generations, but was split up after the building on it deteriorated following her great, great grandfather’s death.
She continues: “Dad demolished everything and started again. “By the time he died, 80% of the renovation had been completed. Now my brothers and I are finishing it for him as his legacy.”. Even when work began nine years ago, the project faced enormous problems.
