So how do you find a house to buy in France? It's not like you can just pop down to the high street estate agents. Do people still do that? We did what I guess everyone else would do and went on line. We found a company called Leggett Immobilier, who were advertising French houses for sale but the website was in English - a good start for us at the beginning but other estate agents are obviously available! We spent hours surfing their website looking at the houses, exclaiming "How much? Is that all?". We also went to the French Property show in London and also the Place in the Sun : Home or away show at the NEC in Birmingham. Leggett's had a large stand at both shows and were really helpful without being too pushy, hard sell types.
It was through Leggett's that we chose the houses to see, and randomly through a tv programme that we chose the area we were going to look at houses in. Since then we have discovered lots of other places to look for houses. The Notaire in each area in France often has a website that advertises houses for sale for locals without the costs incurred from an estate agent. There are lots of French local estate agents, and there are other agents who concentrate on the English market. And last but not least is a website called Le Bon Coin, which is a bit like a French version of ebay but they also sell houses!
Obviously whichever way people choose to go depends on their personal choices, affected by such things as how good your command of the French language is, how much time you have to surf the net or visit the area you're looking in.
Anyway like I said we arranged to view 10 houses initially and then one of the agents threw in a mystery house too, so that was 11 houses that we had formally arranged to visit. In the end we also saw a couple unofficially but that's another part of the story!
So if you speak good French and are happy to do negotiations and deal with the bank, notaire and any legal paperwork, try the notaires websites in the area that you want to live, or contact a local estate agent. If on the other hand you want a bit more support and help with the move I can highly recommend Leggetts Immobiliers. So far they've been absolutely brilliant!! And no they haven't paid me a penny to say that. I don't write posts for financial recompense!
Next time the houses in more details and the things to look out for! Along with a bit more of our story...
Thursday, 19 November 2015
Wednesday, 18 November 2015
First steps to our new life...
After we'd talked and talked and talked round and round in circles we decided that the first step was a trip to France to look at houses and see how we felt being out there. So we booked a dog sitter, flights, a hotel and some house viewings and off we went!
We have lived on the continent, but it was quite a long time ago, and we thought we'd be fine, but wanted to go and see how we felt once we were there. I speak a bit of French, but am out of practice and Hubby doesn't really speak it at all. It took me a couple of days to get my ear tuned in but quite quickly I was understanding large parts of the conversations! I was really chuffed!! It's going to take me a bit longer to be able to think quickly enough to have the conversations myself!
Anyway we arrived in Bordeaux airport to dry, mild weather if a bit cloudy, having left the UK in cold, wet and windy weather. Within 24 hours we were in t-shirts in 22 degrees, blue skies and sunshine! So, that ticked that box then, that area of France generally has much better weather than the UK, and more importantly for us, there are definite seasons. We picked up the hire car (in a moment of complete madness, or return to childhood, I'd upgraded the sensible saloon car Hubby had booked to a soft top convertible) and off we drove to the hotel in the Vendee region we were booked into. The roads were so quiet in comparison to the UK, even the motorways. Driving was a positive pleasure - another tick in the box - and there was so many fewer cars on all the roads we drove on while we were there than there are on the roads in the UK. Okay we had to pay the tolls (peage) on the motorway, but the rest of the roads were sooo good we didn't mind, and actually it wasn't difficult to find ways round the motorways if you wanted to!
So, by this time the idea was beginning to grow legs and looking good. Weather definitely better, driving and roads much better, and when we got to the hotel that was okay too!
We stayed in a hotel in Fontenay le Comte, as that's in the Vendee region where we were house hunting and had booked to see 11 houses in all. The next few days were fascinating, interesting, worthwhile and incredibly tiring, and by the time we flew back we were both so exhausted we could couldn't think straight never mind make any decisions.
But wait, I haven't got that far through the story.... Next time the actual house visits....
We have lived on the continent, but it was quite a long time ago, and we thought we'd be fine, but wanted to go and see how we felt once we were there. I speak a bit of French, but am out of practice and Hubby doesn't really speak it at all. It took me a couple of days to get my ear tuned in but quite quickly I was understanding large parts of the conversations! I was really chuffed!! It's going to take me a bit longer to be able to think quickly enough to have the conversations myself!
Anyway we arrived in Bordeaux airport to dry, mild weather if a bit cloudy, having left the UK in cold, wet and windy weather. Within 24 hours we were in t-shirts in 22 degrees, blue skies and sunshine! So, that ticked that box then, that area of France generally has much better weather than the UK, and more importantly for us, there are definite seasons. We picked up the hire car (in a moment of complete madness, or return to childhood, I'd upgraded the sensible saloon car Hubby had booked to a soft top convertible) and off we drove to the hotel in the Vendee region we were booked into. The roads were so quiet in comparison to the UK, even the motorways. Driving was a positive pleasure - another tick in the box - and there was so many fewer cars on all the roads we drove on while we were there than there are on the roads in the UK. Okay we had to pay the tolls (peage) on the motorway, but the rest of the roads were sooo good we didn't mind, and actually it wasn't difficult to find ways round the motorways if you wanted to!
So, by this time the idea was beginning to grow legs and looking good. Weather definitely better, driving and roads much better, and when we got to the hotel that was okay too!
We stayed in a hotel in Fontenay le Comte, as that's in the Vendee region where we were house hunting and had booked to see 11 houses in all. The next few days were fascinating, interesting, worthwhile and incredibly tiring, and by the time we flew back we were both so exhausted we could couldn't think straight never mind make any decisions.
But wait, I haven't got that far through the story.... Next time the actual house visits....
Sunday, 15 November 2015
What on earth have we done?
This post is in support of our French neighbours after the atrocities in Paris this weekend.
We're an ordinary couple, living an ordinary life, getting up, going to work, doing stuff at the weekends. It was all good. But in the early days of our marriage we had moved around a huge amount, in fact I have lived in 42 houses including the one we're in now. We've been here over 9 years now and in the area 14 or 15 years, and we've both got itchy feet!
Over the last couple of years we've talked occasionally about moving house but convinced ourselves we couldn't afford it, it wasn't the right time, we couldn't leave our jobs, in fact every possible reason for staying. Then something happened. I did a really difficult job, stressful, complicated, too many hours for nowhere near the right return in a difficult stressful, and potentially dangerous environment. I thought I thrived on this sort of challenge, loved it almost, put in over and above the hours I was paid for out of choice and had some great staff working for me who'd been with me almost as long as I'd been in post. Then someone threatened to kill me at work and they meant it. For want of a better phrase I "crashed and burned" and ended up on antidepressants. I won't bore you with the details as it was far more complicated than that really but suffice it to say that I hadn't been thriving on the stresses of the job at all and it was time to rethink our lives!
So here I sit in my kitchen in my nice house somewhere in Wiltshire writing this because I thought someone somewhere out there might be interested in what happens next....
Last week we flew out to France, not on a whim, but certainly without much preparation, looked at quite a few houses, and have put in an offer to buy one! Just like that!
Are you mad I hear you ask? Well maybe we are, but then again maybe we aren't. Maybe we're just looking for a new adventure, and our lives here in the UK at the moment are killing us albeit slowly and we have to change something. We're not fit young free spirits by any imagination (except in our minds!) with both of being well past 50. We've both given most of our working lives to Government run organisations and have decided it's now our time.
We're going to grab this opportunity and idea in both hands and give it our best shot. So if you want to come along for the ride, I'll tell you all about the joys of finding a house, buying a house, moving to France and what we make of our future. I've no doubt there'll be some French bureaucracy in there along with lots of laughter and tears, successes and failures but one things for sure it's going to be one hell of an adventure.
We're an ordinary couple, living an ordinary life, getting up, going to work, doing stuff at the weekends. It was all good. But in the early days of our marriage we had moved around a huge amount, in fact I have lived in 42 houses including the one we're in now. We've been here over 9 years now and in the area 14 or 15 years, and we've both got itchy feet!
Over the last couple of years we've talked occasionally about moving house but convinced ourselves we couldn't afford it, it wasn't the right time, we couldn't leave our jobs, in fact every possible reason for staying. Then something happened. I did a really difficult job, stressful, complicated, too many hours for nowhere near the right return in a difficult stressful, and potentially dangerous environment. I thought I thrived on this sort of challenge, loved it almost, put in over and above the hours I was paid for out of choice and had some great staff working for me who'd been with me almost as long as I'd been in post. Then someone threatened to kill me at work and they meant it. For want of a better phrase I "crashed and burned" and ended up on antidepressants. I won't bore you with the details as it was far more complicated than that really but suffice it to say that I hadn't been thriving on the stresses of the job at all and it was time to rethink our lives!
So here I sit in my kitchen in my nice house somewhere in Wiltshire writing this because I thought someone somewhere out there might be interested in what happens next....
Last week we flew out to France, not on a whim, but certainly without much preparation, looked at quite a few houses, and have put in an offer to buy one! Just like that!
Are you mad I hear you ask? Well maybe we are, but then again maybe we aren't. Maybe we're just looking for a new adventure, and our lives here in the UK at the moment are killing us albeit slowly and we have to change something. We're not fit young free spirits by any imagination (except in our minds!) with both of being well past 50. We've both given most of our working lives to Government run organisations and have decided it's now our time.
We're going to grab this opportunity and idea in both hands and give it our best shot. So if you want to come along for the ride, I'll tell you all about the joys of finding a house, buying a house, moving to France and what we make of our future. I've no doubt there'll be some French bureaucracy in there along with lots of laughter and tears, successes and failures but one things for sure it's going to be one hell of an adventure.
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