Photographs: Desmond Boylan/Reuters.
Cuba has an eclectic mix of colonial and Art Deco homes, apartment complexes and impoverished buildings.
In November 2011, the government decreed that Cubans could buy and sell homes for the first time since the early days of the revolution, paving the way for a real estate market that has become an exercise in bare-knuckled capitalism.
Havana was once considered an architectural jewel with an eclectic mix of colonial homes and modern Art Deco construction, but much of the city outside the touristy old Havana district is in a dilapidated state after decades of neglect and corrosion from humidity and salty sea air.
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A peek into Cuba's housing facilities
Photographs: Desmond Boylan/Reuters.
People walk beside a house in Havana's Miramar prime real estate area.
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A peek into Cuba's housing facilities
Photographs: Desmond Boylan/Reuters.
People stand at the entrance of their colonial-style houses in Havana's prime real estate area of the "The Malecon" seafront boulevard.
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A peek into Cuba's housing facilities
Photographs: Desmond Boylan/Reuters.
A car is driven beside colonial-style houses on Havana's prime real estate area of the "The Malecon" seafront boulevard.
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A peek into Cuba's housing facilities
Photographs: Desmond Boylan/Reuters.
A woman stands at the entrance of her home on sale for $5,000, in Havana's Vedado area.
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A peek into Cuba's housing facilities
Photographs: Desmond Boylan/Reuters.
A woman stands at the entrance of her home on sale for $5,000, in Havana's Vedado area.
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A peek into Cuba's housing facilities
Photographs: Desmond Boylan/Reuters.
A health worker fumigates inside a home in Havana.
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A peek into Cuba's housing facilities
Photographs: Enrique De La Osa/Reuters.
Enrique Rodriguez, 67, sits inside his home in Havana.
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A peek into Cuba's housing facilities
Photographs: Desmond Boylan/Reuters.
Migrant laborer Osleidis (C) and his neighbours work on the final details of his new home built on a piece of fallow state-owned land on the outskirts of Havana.
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A peek into Cuba's housing facilities
Photographs: Claudia Daut/Reuters.
A man holds a pig on a leash while sitting outside his home in Santiago de Cuba.
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A peek into Cuba's housing facilities
Photographs: Desmond Boylan/Reuters.
Women look out of their apartment window in Havana.
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A peek into Cuba's housing facilities
Photographs: Marc Frank/Reuters.
Jose Ramirez stands in front of his house that he is asking $55,000 for, in the city of Ciego de Avila, central Cuba.
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A peek into Cuba's housing facilities
Photographs: Enrique De La Osa/Reuters.
A child looks from the window of his house in Havana.
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A peek into Cuba's housing facilities
Photographs: Enrique De La Osa/Reuters.
A man walks past housing apartments in Havana.
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A peek into Cuba's housing facilities
Photographs: Enrique De La Osa/Reuters.
A man hangs up clothes on the balcony of his apartment in Havana.
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A peek into Cuba's housing facilities
Photographs: Desmond Boylan/Reuters.
People walk past a house decorated with mural in Havana.
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A peek into Cuba's housing facilities
Photographs: Desmond Boylan/Reuters.
A man cycles beside a house in Havana's upmarket Miramar district.
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A peek into Cuba's housing facilities
Photographs: Desmond Boylan/Reuters.
A woman stands at the door of her home in Havana.
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A peek into Cuba's housing facilities
Photographs: Desmond Boylan/Reuters.
A man waits for customers his privately-licensed coffee stall at the entrance of his home in Havana.
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A peek into Cuba's housing facilities
Photographs: Desmond Boylan/Reuters.
Men build a new home beside an old palm-tree wood house at a farm in the village of Campo Florido, 40 kilometres (18 miles) from Havana.
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A peek into Cuba's housing facilities
Photographs: Enrique De La Osa/Reuters.
A man sits in the door of his house in Holguin.
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A peek into Cuba's housing facilities
Photographs: Claudia Daut/Reuters.
A woman carries a ventilator outside her house as Hurricane Ike approaches in Playa Giron on the south coast of Cuba.
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A peek into Cuba's housing facilities
Photographs: Enrique De La Osa/Reuters.
A man walks past a house in San Antonio de los Banos, Havana.
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A peek into Cuba's housing facilities
Photographs: Jorge Silva/Reuters.
A woman stands on the balcony of her house, which is located along the block-long painting known as "Callejon de Hamel" (Hamel street) in Centro Havana.
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A peek into Cuba's housing facilities
Photographs: Claudia Daut/Reuters.
A family steps out of a house next to a door decorated with doves in Havana.
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A peek into Cuba's housing facilities
Photographs: Carlos Barria/Reuters.
Children sit at the door of a house next to an old man in Havana.
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A peek into Cuba's housing facilities
Photographs: Claudia Daut/Reuters.
Meple, a psychologist and university professor, walks down the staircase as his seven-month old daughter Africa takes a nap on a mat on the floor at their home in the Cerro neighborhood in Havana.
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A peek into Cuba's housing facilities
Photographs: Claudia Daut/Reuters.
Juan Carlos Flores, a poet and performance artist, lights a cigarette in the kitchen of his apartment in Alamar.
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A peek into Cuba's housing facilities
Photographs: Claudia Daut/Reuters.
Film historian Zoia Barash, 72, drinks a cup of tea in her apartment in Havana.
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A peek into Cuba's housing facilities
Photographs: Enrique De La Osa/Reuters.
People stand outside their house in Havana.
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