Archive for: May 2007

In my trawling around the Internet looking for niches and structures I can work with, I came across this group in Facebook You know you have been too long in France when. You need to join facebook to read …

Many French people learn the departments in France and their associated numbers at school - I have even been to a Lotto (Bingo) where the caller gave the names of the main town in a department instead of a …

After all the data collected by International Living (health, quality of life, modernity, culture, security, money, etc.) has been crunched, France has come first on the list of the countries in the world offering the best quality of life. …

Many people are asking for advice about investing in rental property in France as an investment for a pension or other long term investment. I recently did a brief study with a client on four apartments in Sete where

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If you buy your home for a great view, a quite neighbourhood or for local services, nice neighbours or low taxes - guess what will happen next !

I read somewhere, “The only thing certain in life is change” (Google says it was Confucius, but he didn’t speak English - please mail me if you know who it was).

France is not a country with a “compensation culture” - the quote “All for one and one for all” comes from Dumas ( I am pretty sure about that) and the Rights Of Man are engraved in stone “literally” in many public places in France.

However, here is a mail exchange I had today ….

Jatropha is a word I have never noticed hearing before today, when a client asked about buying 50 hectares of land here in Languedoc to grow it as a crop for bio-diesel production.

A quick read through some Google …

If you are purchasing a property in France with a hectare or more of land, then the purchase will be brought to the the attention of SAFER http://www.safer.fr/ (The Société d’Amenagément Foncier et d’Establissement Rural) by the Notaire.

This can cause problems you did not expect and you must get all matters clearly sorted, (by your honest and clever estate-agent) in writing, before you sign.

And it really is - I am always asked for photos and information about the towns and villages properties are in - as most French estate agents do not even tell you where a property is until you sign a paper guaranteeing their commission, showing local photos is just not done - until now.

A “Muse of Fire”  would be useful when I am writing these notes about my days of working as an estate agent in France - I spend a lot of time answering questions and “walking through” the legal agreements with

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A lot of my time is spent in reading and replying to emails from people looking for property or asking about making a life in France.

Carole and I came to France to escape from, what we saw as, a decaying …