Do border areas offer underrated real estate?

 By George ELIOT

The hubs of economic activity in almost all countries are the capital city and/or the biggest metropolitan areas. Real estate prices in those territories tend to be higher than in the rest of the country.

On the other hand, border areas tend to be neglected as borders create barriers to transport and trade and function as an "event horizon" for the legal framework of the country. So the prices of land and other real estate tend to be lower near the border.

However, if two countries created an interconnected set of two special economic zones (SEZ) along their shared border, with the SEZ on one side of the border being the mirror image of the SEZ on the other side, could the barriers to transport, trade and investment between the two SEZ be lower than between the countries overall? And could the newly created hub of economic activity benefit from the initially lower real estate prices to attract investment in both property development and industry/services?

Countries by length of their land borders (Source: Wikipedia)



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