What happened to a 66-year-old plumber is going to surprise you, and I’m sure you would like to be him. He was about to retire and he was working at an old house, sounds like a normal thing, right? Well, the thing is that when he suddenly lifted a piece of floor he discovered a box filled with gold coins! What an incredible story, so let’s find out more about what happened.
An incredible finding
This happened in the Penzing district of Vienna. The plumber was working in the basement of an older villa and, while repairing something, he noticed a cable sticking out of the concrete floor. The cable seemed stuck, so he dug a bit deeper to see what was going on.
Under the concrete, there was something solid: a rusty metal box. He had no idea what it could be, but he was curious to find out (of course). So, he decided to open the box and he saw gold coins in a very good condition, almost perfect, with the image of the famous composer Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart stamped on them.
In total, the coins weighed 30 kg and the value of that gold would be several million euros, about 2.4 million.
What must the plumber do?
This case caught many people’s attention because it shows something that rarely happens: a plumber doing his job, and finding something that could change his life. However, what he found doesn’t become his property automatically, there are some laws about this.
In Austria, there is a clear rule that explains what happens if somebody finds a hidden treasure. Even though many people believe that ‘’the one who finds it, keeps it’’, it is not that simple.
According to Section 399 of the Austrian Civil Code, when someone finds a treasure in a property, the value must be divided in two equal parts: 50% for the person who found it and 50% for the owner of the land or the house. So, if the estimated value of that gold is 2.4 million of euros, the plumber would receive about 1.2 millions (before taxes or other costs.).
Second World War
Something many people wonder is who hid the treasure and why. Historians explain that, during the 1930 and 1940, especially during World War II, most families hid their valuable belongings in basements, walls or underground. They did this to protect them from thefts, bombings, confiscation, or wartime chaos.
The problem is that most of those families never came back, which is why treasures like this keep appearing once in a while. Yet, nobody knows who was the original owner of the treasure the plumber found, when the gold was hidden, and why it ended up under concrete.
Responsibilities
This situation is not as easy as finding gold and selling it. Austria has rules about what must be reported, mostly if the finding could have historical or cultural significance. The Federal Monuments Office offers guidelines explaining why notifying authorities is necessary before doing anything with the treasure. This is important because the gold could be evidence in questions about cultural heritage, wartime ownership, or historical events.
And, of course, this changes the plumber’s retirement plans completely. One moment he is thinking about pensions and regular bills… and the next he’s dealing with lawyers, appraisers, and figuring out where to store 30 kilos of gold safely.
To sum up
In the end, an ordinary workday became an unforgettable story — one that mixes luck, history, law, and a whole lot of gold. Incredible, right? What would you do if you happened to find that hidden treasure?