Where is the French property market going?

I presume the OP is also the writer of the blog that is attached. If so he is obviously renovating a beautiful historical home in in the U.K. which will undoubtedly result in a good profit when he comes to sell. In the introduction to the blog he has expressed his intention to open a B and B in France but I wonder if his post is more to do with the viability of renovating and selling on old stone buildings in France. If so that is a very different question to the one about fluctuations in the French housing market.

Hi David. Thanks for reading my blog. To clarify, I’m not ‘renovating’ the house pictured so much as living in it, as I have been for 13 years. I have spent quite a lot on it… new roof, re-wiring, new plumbing, bathroom and kitchen etc as well as re-decorating throughout… but only to make a comfortable home for my family. When we come to sell it I expect we’ll get little more than we paid for it plus the cost of the above, if we’re lucky.

My original post was genuinely about which direction people thought house prices in France are going as I’d read one or two ‘articles’ suggesting a pre-Brexit rush to buy property and wondered whether forum members could shed any light on the truth or otherwise of this. As you may have noticed from my blog, we aren’t going to be able to buy a place until 2020 at the earliest so who knows where we’ll be by then. However, if and when we do buy a place to open a B&B, it certainly won’t be with a view to cashing in if prices go up.

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Hi Richard. My sleepless nights are more about whether we’ll be able to move to France at all, though the affordability of a suitable property for our plans (B&B business) does come into it. That is quite different to ‘speculating’ but I understand how it might have been ambiguous.

You can’t have it all Paul ! Why use the French for cheaper living then go back to the UK when things get tough when you are old. And don’t even want to pay taxes after if you stay. Where can you live without paying taxes? I think that was not a nice thing to post on line. You should’ve just stayed where you came from then. People should stop using using France/Spain/Portugal for a quick cheap getaway. Mostly they all end up going back home eventually. After Brexit, they will all be going back I bet - they will have no medical aid - like the NHS. Unless they are rich. I live in Switzerland, we still have to pay tax and full medical aid even after going on pension, which we are doing now, that costs us nearly 2,000 CHF per month. We rent - so have to pay that too, plus food, tv, electricity, car and home insurance etc. I can’t go “home” when things get tough. I’m Swiss. France is my neighbour. Please don’t abuse them and use them.

This seems a slightly confused post - and not very friendly despite you having “liked” the post to which you are replying.

First I live in the UK currently, secondly I hardly come to France for a “cheap getaway”, I come to stay in France despite the fact that we generally find it more expensive than the UK. Even the French must think so because those that live close to the Spanish border regularly cross it to take advantage of cheaper prices in Spain.

Third I am not averse to paying taxes - as a higher rate tax payer in the UK I pay a fair chunk and I pay my local taxes in France just like every other home owner, we also pay for water, electricity and phone and ferry crossings (to Brittany Ferries, a French company) which makes the French economy better off to the tune of about 3-4k€ a year at my expense. A second property for holidays is not a cheap option.

However even though I do not shirk my responsibility to pay tax I do not see why I would wish to maximise my tax burden rather than minimise it. Were I to move to France, it would be after my retirement and income will be considerably less - it hardly seems unfair to take all my outgoings into consideration in deciding whether to make a semi-permanent move.

If I were to decide to retire to France I would be paying even more of my own money into the economy but my healthcare would not be paid for by the French state in any event - it would either be paid for by the UK government via the S1 scheme (if it continues post Brexit) or by me having to have health insurance.

I’m hardly cheating France and being a burden on them if I plan to move over when healthy and back when frail - as I said having to negotiate healthcare in a 2nd language is difficult and I would not have the same support network in France.

But either way - whether I move to France permenently or visit for a max of three months and go home that is MY choice. I will pay taxes, as appropriate, in one of these countries.

Finally - I am sorry that you find Switzerland so expensive but that has little to do with whether I chose to move under French tax jurisdiction.

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Hello Jennifer
A lot of sweeping statements there.

" People should stop using using France/Spain/Portugal for a quick cheap getaway. Mostly they all end up going back home eventually."

So “they all end up going home”, what do you base this on please, who are these people?
“A cheap getaway”, not at all, we pay our taxes in Europe whether it be those who have 2nd homes or live in Europe full time.

“After Brexit, they will all be going back I bet - they will have no medical aid - like the NHS.”

Actually ‘they’ won’t all be going back, there are countless British who have chosen to stay in Europe ! There are countless of us who pay into medical schemes in Europe. Those British who have paid into the NHS and decide to return will no doubt be covered by previous contibutions, but that’s for them to sort out.

We ALL pay for food, it’s your choice to run a car and have a tv. Switzerland is expensive but I have friends who live and work there and they have a high standard of living. They go across to France to buy wine and other things that they find better value. That is the freedom of Europe.

Your remarks are aimed at the British, don’t forget that there are many Europeans in the UK who ‘benefit’ from what that country has to offer ! As I understand it they will be ‘protected’ after Brexit, those British in Europe don’t as yet have that assurance.

Lastly, telling someone to stay where they come from is not a pleasant remark !

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Pleased you’re not one of our neighbours, who are very pleasant :+1: Jenny. :slightly_smiling_face:

I know a lot of French people who use Tunisia, Morocco for their holiday or a warmer full winter. Why not ? I don’t see anything wrong with it, people are free to do what they want. As far as I know it’s not illegal and they are spending the money they’ve earned the way they want.

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Absolutely 100% with you on your last comment! To the extent that anyone who goes down that “comment road” is more than welcome to find another forum to spout that line on.
Just sayin :slight_smile:

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Exactly Catharine, we all have our point of view and I like that we can discuss our opinions/give advice on here without getting ‘too personal’.
Of course we are not sheep so there are bound to be little disagreements/hiccups but unpleasantness is uncalled for and not warranted.
On verra ! :hugs:

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I would say and advise those that have been out of the UK for sometime and considering moving back to blighty for their old age, do do your research before making that decision. As many have advised in these forums to remove your rose tinted specs before moving to France. I would strongly advise removing them before moving back to the UK to. The NHS is really in crisis, and not a single trust in England met it waiting time limits this reporting year. The social care structure is on the brink of collapse and the home care visitors are stretched beyond the limit. My aging parents are heading into their 80’s and live in sheltered housing, in recent years they have had their warden removed, their life line service cut and their group transport that gets them to the shops and out and about cut. The lifeline service they have now don’t respond 9 out of 10 times it’s used and they find it’s quicker to call an ambulance than wait for a response. My father has been undergoing cancer treatment in the last year and twice on appointments he had to ask a nurse to help explain what his Dr was saying as the Dr’s English was not great. I’m in no way a racist I could not be further from that, this was mearly to highlight to those saying they don’t want to get ill in France and not understand what’s wrong, that this can easily be the same in the UK you just may not have to wait several months for this to happen in France! There is currently something like a 40,000 person shortage in NHS staff and it is getting bigger every year as Brexit bites. Costs are increasing for medication and prescriptions and waiting times and the time doctors have to see you is very limited. I guess my point is be sure not to think the UK has not changed since you left it it has very very much so. The pace of life, services, benefits and care system have all declined in the last 10 years. Depression, suicide and loneliness among the elderly in the UK has risen dramatically and people do not look out for the elderly here anymore. The French family values won’t be found in the UK and you may well find you are far better off in France growing old than in the UK. It’s just my opinion but I’m a civil servant of many years and even I find it hard to defend the UK in its current form, inward looking, insular, fractured in its outlook. Crime rising, living standards decreasing costs spiralling and nationalism on the rise, overcrowded towns and roads and minimal investment in public infrastructure and a real housing crisis. Add the Brexit debacle on top and it’s not hard to see why my partner and I are heading to France. And for the record it is with my aging parents blessing.

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To be honest Brian I think the grass in the next field always looks more appetising. You can’t see the bare patches and the thistles and nettles from a distance, but when they’re there in your face it’s hard to ignore them.

GP coverage in rural France is very patchy. I’m not even rural and my médecin traitant is retiring at the end of the year, which will leave a commune of around 3000 people with one doctor. And that doctor has a poor rep and isn’t trusted, she has always been second choice to the doctor who is retiring.

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Thanks to a documentary on St Valery sur Somme on the BBC a few months ago, I am now surrounded by plenty of brits every week-ends.

Some of them are now hanging and cycling around in the countryside. I have even been asked in my own garden if I wanted to sell my house. I said yes of course for ten millions. I still have hope that one day a british lord will say yes.

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Our english speaking doctor only works two mornings a week.
At my last appointment I had cause to complain about the treatment, or lack of it, when I had a chest infection.
Waiting for it to get worse and then going to Urgence is not the advice I expect from my primary care.
There is another doctor in a nearby village who works on his own and still does not use a computer.
Incredible.
We have to allow three weeks to make appointment to see our doctor, which we can do on line.
What is it like in your area.

Jane three weeks is about average in the UK right now in our area anyway. And most people do go to A&E instead now days which is why the NHS is in crisis it’s no better here believe me!

I live here with my mother who will soon be 87 years young. Briefly I already lived here in France when my parents had a RTA in the UK, around 20 odd years ago now.
The lack of care they recieved was disgusting.
I won’t go into everything but after my father died I brought my mother here to live with me.
First port of call was my doctor, she was appalled at the ‘care’ my mother had received, her words ‘It’s like the middle ages’.
Mum, with me along for translation, was sent to Limoges, a specialist hospital where they ‘pulled out all stops’. After 8 weeks of re-education she was allowed home.
I cannot fault in any way the care that she has received, it’s been incredible.
My husband, some years ago had a massive heart attack here in France, our doctor came at 3 am and set all the procedures in place. A helicopter was needed to transfer him to a specialist hospital, they couldn’t land in our field as there was a storm under way.
Paramedics were sent by road and he was transferred to a hospital 60 kms away, a call was put out for an air ambulance and they were able to land in the hospital grounds.
To cut a long story short he was transferred to a top hospital where they again ‘pulled out all stops’.
It’s thanks to the excellent service here that he and my mother are both alive today.
There is a dearth of generalists in rural France, but my goodness, when you are in real need , when it’s literally a life or death situation I would rather be here than in the UK!

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From all the inputs I read here connected with health care it would seem that services in Brittany are certainly way above average. 99% of people here consider them to be outstanding. The only two commonly heard complaints cocern waiting times for optometrists and dermatologists.

So I understand from UK tv.

This makes me sad.

This place has been for sale ever since we first came to the Tarn for a visit in May 2008. Back then I recall the price was something like 670,000€.

We ended up living next door and had our wedding meal here in July 2009, at the table in the second photo. The food was lovely.

http://www.lopez-immobilier.fr/annonces/achat/maison/saint-amans-soult-81/142171699.htm

We looked around a house 18 months ago, at this time there were a block of 3 houses for sale in a small village.

After a while of negotiating settled on a price about half of the original asking price.

We signed on the dotted line on a Monday, the Wednesday of that same week the other 2 houses also sold to separate people. I have no idea what has happened for all 3 to exchange in the same week.

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