We are looking to rent a house or apartment in France as soon as possible.
Requirements
- 2 bedrooms
- Self-contained
- Ideally furnished (doesn’t have to be)
- Parking
- Happy for dog
- Near-ish a school
Reasons
We are looking to move to France permanently. We will buy but we don’t have time before the Brexit deadline. So, we are looking for a house or apartment to rent while we find and buy a house (about 6 months – 1 year).
Work
We are planning to start a micro-enterprise to get in the French system and exercise our treaty rights before Brexit. You would need to be happy to give us a rental contract, and we would need our own EDF agreements etc to start this business at the property. The business is online only (I am a web developer) so no visitors / noise or fuss. Essentially this would be out primary residence until we buy
Who
We are a couple (38 & 37) with a child (7)
Where
We are flexible on location
Rent
Under 1,500 euros a month
Income
We run a business in the UK which is managed by our staff. We have an income that will continue in France.
Good luck with your search: French rental law is very different to in the UK and it is notoriously difficult getting accepted as a tenant in France if you don’t have a permanent job contract or a guarantor who does.
There could be potential complications with your plan though.
Are you intending to continue to run the UK business remotely from France? If so, and if you will be taking a salary from that business, you will need to be paying French social security contributions on that income (unless you have some kind of EU posted worker or cross border arrangement in place, which will likely end with Brexit). Cotisations must be paid on all earned income from work you do from your home in France; starting a micro doesn’t sidestep the need to pay cotisations on what you earn from the UK business.
On the other hand if you will no longer in fact be economically active for the UK business, you will be taking dividends but not earning salaries, and the micro will be your only source of earned income, how will the other partner “get into the system”? Micros are designed to be one person businesses but as such they only give health cover for one person (plus dependent children). The process of “getting into the system” is different for economically inactive people, and they may not end up with the same rights as workers after Brexit. As long as inactifs are exercising FoM correctly they will be granted the right to live in France, but they won’t necessarily have the right to work in France.
Thanks for the reply.
Yes, we have applied for a few places but have lost out to people already in France, hence turning to the expat community.
As for the move, yes we will cease to be economically active in the UK. Its a real move but brought forward from one we have been planning for ages.
My understanding is that my wife can be a conjoint collaborateur of the micro entreprise and that will do the job. We do actually work together so it’s true.
We can help We have a lovely furnished converted barn near to Gourdon & Sarlat, We have helped other renters in a similar situation as yourselves. Please e mail me on dordogneholidaybarn @gmail.com if you would like to discuss. Thanks Bob McNeil
Thanks, I have sent you an email.