An abandoned French chateau can become your dream home if you can restore it.

In November 2020, Paris antiques dealer Alisanne Frew received word of a rare find: a beautiful 19th-century château in the Bordeaux district was up for sale. The château, built of the same limestone as the historic center of Bordeaux, was two-story, had magnificent proportions and refined classical finishes.

The only condition of the deal was that only the four exterior walls were included in the sale. Frue agreed immediately. "I knew I was going to buy it," she says, recalling the moment she saw vintage photos of the Chateau negative on her phone screen. She immediately booked a trip and was there the next day. Now all 5,389 pieces of those walls have been cleaned, sorted, packaged and are being prepared for''exports. Frue plans to ship them to America.

A real estate agent at Sotheby's International Realty in Austin, Texas, Kumara Wilcoxson is accepting offers. Frue says she paid $2.25 million for the pieces and invested another $650,000 in preparing them for resale.

Frew says she's making every effort to find''exterior walls are expected to cost about $3.2 million.

The château has its own history, part of which Frue is unwilling to reveal. She says the château was built in 1890 by an aristocratic family with ties to the city of Toulouse (today the largest city in mid-southwest France), and was apparently intended as a hunting chateau. Frue says she has found descendants of the family, as well as where the château stood in southern Bordeaux, but says this information will only be revealed to the buyer. "The owners are still using the building and extensive grounds for their country house," she says, pointing to an 18th-century house standing there "with antiques and stuff".