purelyfrance

Creating a Property Specification - it pays dividends 

This Post talks about drawing up a Property Specification.  We recommend you do it. At the very least it could save your marriage or friendship!!  A Property spec also provides a number of benefits.  It acts as a good discipline and a base document to refer to; it is helpful when you need to provide information to Immobiliers (real estate agencies); and importantly it ensures that there is total agreement between spouses/partners as to your expectations!!

 

Here is the spec we created when we were searching for our Burgundy B n B property, which we originally bought in partnership with another couple. In italics, I have indicated how we actually fared against our initial desires!!

1. Location - within 40 kms of Beaune, or  within 20 kms of Cluny, or within 20 kms of Chablis/Auxerre

As we were going to create a B n B, our starting point was to be located somewhere close to a Tourist attraction. People don’t come to an area just because you have a B n B!!  We saw one beautiful property, a Chateau, which would have been ideal and was at a very good price, but its location was far too remote so rightly we resisted the temptation.  We ended up 15kms from Beaune.

2. Situated - in a village or very close to a village

We are on the fringes of a village. We would have liked the village to have more services/facilities, so we compromised on this one.

3. Property - with character or memorable appeal, a grande maison, moulin, small château, etc

Our property consists of an elegant Maison de Maitre, extensive outbuildings and ‘extra’ features such as a 16th c wine press and an ancient Swiss oven room.

4. Possibly an existing chambres d’hôte or small hotel or has potential to be operated as one

It was a private home when we bought it but it clearly had potential as B n B/Gite accommodation.

5. 10 - 12 bedrooms

It had 5 bedrooms in the ‘Maison’ (just as importantly, 3 existing bathrooms) and potential to create 3 further Gites.

6. Property Condition - little or no significant restoration works required

We always recommend buying a property that is currently being lived in. Unless you have lots of money and three years of your life to spare!! Not always of course, but it does lower the risk of any ‘nasty’ surprises. Our property required a lot of renovation, some installation of second walls to minimise noise, and a rework of bathrooms. It had however been built with quality materials and was in good condition. It still took a year to complete!!

  

Nice old house to renovate said the Advertisement - I don’t think so!

7. Owners Accommodation - required for two couples, can be apartments contained within the main building or separate outbuilding (dépendance)

We managed this with two apartments located in the outbuildings.

8. Terrain - preferably 2 - 4 hectares

In retrospect the size of land was a bit ambitious, we ended up with 1 hectare (2.5 acres) which is more than ample and that takes enough time to keep maintained!!

One of the major advantages of having a written spec is that it enables you to very quickly eliminate a lot of properties, even without sighting them, therefore saving you a lot of time and frustration. We definitely recommend you create your own, it worked really well for us!

A Bientot,

Bruce.

Bonjour a Tous,

Today, Michelin have made their 2007 announcements on which restaurants have been awarded which stars.

The big news is the third star awarded to female chef Anne-Sophie Pic and her restaurant la Maison Pic located in Valence. (Drome)  Mme Pic (at left)is the only 3 star female chef in France.  Pause for a minute, the ONLY 3 star female chef in France.  If you have read my earlier Posts you may recall I was questioning whether France was ready for a female President.  In France, food and politics are often in the same pot, usually simmering simultaneously.  Only time will tell if the French are ready to sit down to a 9 course political menu prepared by a Madame!!

In other Michelin news we are delighted that our local Michelin rated restuarant at Chagny, Lameloise has won back the 3rd star it lost a couple of years ago. Bravo to Jacques Lameloise and his team.

On the demerit side, one restaurant which has had 3 stars for 33 years, Taillevent, has lost a star as has the restaurant Le Cinq at the luxurious George V Hotel in Paris. So if you were thinking of a stay in that Parisien landmark (standard rooms start at 710 euros a night) you may wish to reconsider!!

A Bientot,

Bruce.

As foreigners living full time in France, the most common question we field from guests is, ‘How do you get along with the French?  It is really a question with two parts. How are we received by the French, and secondly, how do we find the French?

We can categorically say that we have never for one moment ever been made to feel we were other than welcome.  We have always been greeted warmly, treated with respect, and have had scores of offers of kind and thoughtful assistance.  I will quickly remind you that we have not lived in Paris!!   But in Provence, and the Cote d’Azur  now here in Burgundy  it has been the same treatment.

 

For example!  Our neighbour in Saint Rémy-de-Provence was Renee, a recently widowed 82 year old, ‘41 years in that knee, and 41 years in this knee’ he would tell us. Renee owned an antique shop just around the corner, along from the Nostradamus fountain.  In our first few days of taking up residence we thought we should do the neighbourly thing and go and introduce ourselves.  To our surprise and delight he immediately invited us to his home that evening for ‘un aperitif’. 

That’s when we learnt to drink pastis.  Three hours later we could hardly make it back up the stairs. Poor Anne had an even bigger challenge. The drink options were pastis, scotch or muscat, none of which Anne ever drinks, so she opted for muscat being the lesser of the three evils.  Or so she thought.  Renee, while dispensing our ‘seconds’, (or was it thirds?) inadvertently poured scotch on top of her remaining muscat. Cat-a-strophe! Being the robust Aussie that she is, Anne valiantly sipped her way through it.

Another example.  One of your first actions in France, probably carried out by 95% of foreigners, is to visit your local bricolage (D.I.Y) shop. After three visits, Marjolene asked if we were doing a lot of ‘travaux’ an all encompassing word for ‘work’. As we were, she told us she would open an account for us, which apart from making it more convenient with one monthly payment it meant we accessed ‘trade’ prices which we thought was very generous.

Now you may be thinking, what are they saying behind our backs?  Without a doubt they talk about us, we are a novelty after all. But of course not only do we not know but we will never know! They are too respectful and too subtle for that to happen!!  They too have questions, which are always the same. Why are you living in France, and why did you leave such beautiful countries? (Australia and New Zealand) Which is quickly followed by ‘c’est mon reve, mon reve’ (my dream) to visit Australia/New Zealand. (well okay, usually Australia!)

So, how do we find the French?  Arrogant? Non. Intolerant? Non. Impolite, inconsiderate, disinterested?  Non, non, non!  We have no idea where these perceptions of the French come from, but they seem to be commonly held by those who have yet to visit France. (Perhaps there is one unhelpful waiter in a café somewhere on the Champs Elysees!) 

 

On the contrary we find the French to be charming, respectful, helpful, passionate, humorous and stimulating people. There is much to admire in the way they live their lives. We admire most the way they have retained ‘respect’, a quality that is fast disappearing in many Western societies. Respect is of course imbedded in their language, the use of the formal ‘vous’ and the more familiar ‘tu’.  But they have also preserved it within their social behaviour.

 You can be waiting in line to purchase a ticket at the railway station. When a staff member arrives to take up his/her position their first act is to move down the row of booths to kiss, kiss their colleagues. No matter that for a minute or two all work stops and clients wait, everyone understands that is the custom and the proper conduct to observe.  We think it is delightful.

Here in Chaudenay, each January the Mayor holds a welcome reception for everyone who has moved into the area in the previous 12 months.  It is for everyone, not solely for foreigners, and to us it typifies their commitment to hospitality, their caring, community attitude, and their pride in wanting to create and preserve a friendly, non-stress living environment.

They have many, many endearing traits, their social ability over any given meal, how they can be so unrushed over a cup of coffee, their perspective of ‘time,’ (once you get use to it!!) their ability to debate issues with passion and conviction. To return to the original question, we find the French just great, we learn a lot from them, we love them!!

A Bientot,

Bruce.

The match up: Bed and Breakfast versus Self-Catering accommodation

If you have the choice between these two types of accommodation you are in a good position. If you are a tiger for punishment you can of course offer both!! This Post explores the differences between operting a B n B and Self-catering accommodation whether that be a Cottage, Apartments or Gites. We will look at the characteristics of each as well as their pros and cons. Each of them have both!

We cut our teeth on a small B n B in Provence with 2 double bedrooms and an attic style single room. We then graduated to a 5 bedroom B n B here in Burgundy, eventually added a self-catering Apartment to our portfolio. Last year we switched to an all self-catering operation offering two apartments and a Cottage, 5 bedrooms in all.

Why did we change?  The key reasons revolved around time, demand and simplicity. We suspect like many starry-eyed B n B owners, our loose plan was, step 1, get the B n B created and operating. (12 months hard work skipped over in those few words!) Step 2, look around for some other income related activity to occupy ourselves in our ’spare’ time.  The slight miscalculation we made was how much, or rather how little time we would have available.

A relatively ‘normal’ B n B day for us went something like this. Between 0600 and 0630, Elle, our Australian born, pure breed maine coon cat would let us know it was time to get up and feed her. (while a totally appropriate name for a cat living in France, Elle was named after that other Australian of the same name - mainly as I admire Elle Mac’s business acumen) First task was to prepare for le petit dejeuner. Breakfast itself would occupy us until 1030.  Understandably, guests are always in holiday mode so are quite happy to sit around and chat. It was at least 1100 before breakfast was cleared away, dishes washed and dried and the table reset.

Then the cleaning session began, which we did every day. Towels to be laundered, beds to be remade, bathrooms to be cleaned, hoovering, dusting et al. You can count on 45 mins per bedroom, plus the common areas. So together with a hurried bite to eat for lunch, the clock rolled around to 1400 before we knew it. Then there is always one errand or another to run. Shopping for provisions, posting mail, paying bills, sourcing material from the Tourism office, or just having your haircut!

We specified to new guests an arrival time of 1500. So from that time on, at least one of us needed to be on ‘duty’.  We rarely knew the arrival time which could be between 1500 and 2100. That excludes the occasional guests who would telephone to say they were lost!  Around 1700 our existing guests would arrive home so you would spend time talking with them about their adventures for that day. Then there may have been restaurant bookings to make. So when you throw in emails to be answered, an occasional aperitif with the guests, cooking our own evening meal and French language lessons, you can see the amount of ’spare’ time amounts to precious little!

Contrast that with self-catering accommodation. Saturday is usually ‘change over’ day. So it is full on with departing guests, and preparing the Gites for your new arrivals. But bathroom and bedroom linen are only changed weekly, and no further cleaning is required until the next Saturday comes around. So you can see immediately, self-catering is definitely not as time absorbing as a B n B operation. This once weekly servicing also has a big impact, i.e. reduction, on your costs. So while with self-catering your income is likely to be less, your costs will be substantially lower and therefore produce a better bottom line.

Another interesting difference is the nationality make-up of your guests. For our B n B, guests were roughly split 25% British, 25% American/Canadian, 25% Australia/New Zealand and 25% rest of Europe and Asia. For our self-catering accommodation, 50%  come from the UK, 30% from Australia/New Zealand, 10% rest of Europe and 10% from North America.  We were surprised to learn how much market demand exists for self-catering, particularly as Burgundy is not a ’sun and sand’ type of destination. The B n B season starts earlier, but for June through September we have little trouble filling our apartments. To help attract bookings for the earlier months, March, April, and May we do accept stays of less than one week.

We find generally, self-catering guests tend to be more experienced holiday makers. This particularly applies to our British guests, many of whom have some French language skills. Consequently they require a much lower level of assistance and therefore occupy less of your time.

But the biggest driver to determine whether B n B or Gites are ‘right’ for you is your own motivation. If you thirst for people interaction; if you thrive in social situations with interesting people from a range of countries; if it is your sole business activity; if you want to provide table d’hotes then a B n B is likely to be the right recipe for you.  But…….we suggest you ensure your personal living accommodation is separate and private from your guest accommodation.

If on the other hand, your time is at a premium, you have other commercial activities, you are seeking to supplement your income and/or make more productive use of your assets then you may well find the self-catering scenario is more suited to you.

In our next Post in our B n B & Gites for fun and profit series we will be discussing the not so easy task of setting your tariffs. (rates)

A Bientot,

Bruce.

Selecting an Area of France

WARNING! A bit like that one on the side of cigarettes!!  Living in France is very different to holidaying in France.  It is important to choose the area of France best suited to you.  Otherwise it can be dangerous to your health, your mental health at least!!

More positively, let’s look at how best to select where in France you wish to live. Our own motivations have been varied. In Provence it was purely instinctive.  Knee jerk some would say!  We visited Saint Remy  loved the town and the surrounding area and ‘tripped over’ a suitable property. For Nice  we were pulled there for business reasons. The weather appealed as well. Here in Burgundy it was a life style coupled with business choice. Being close to vineyards was probably also a factor!  Along the way we compiled a checklist to determine if we and the area were a compatible match. Here are some key factors for you to consider to choose your ‘dream’ region of France.

 1. Access.  We think this is more important than weather considerations. For a variety of reasons you need good air, road and/or rail access. This assumes you want family and friends to find you. Sometimes that is debatable! If you are going to offer holiday accommodation you want your potential clients to reach you as easily as possible. It is a good tip to study the route maps of the major European airlines such as BA, Air France, Lufthansa and KLM. But as importantly, run a check on these low cost carriers, Easyjet  and Ryanair.

Both of these carriers have in recent years extended their networks substantially, opening up a number of ’secondary’ airports and regions within France. Bravo to them! Toulon, Montpellier, St Etienne, Carcassone, and Toulouse are some good examples. They both rely almost exclusively on holiday or VFR (visiting friends or relatives) passengers so if they have 2 or 3 flights per day into a particular airport it will give you some confidence there are reasonable levels of holidaymakers visiting that region.

 For road access you are probably aware France has an excellent network of autoroutes.(motorways) They are well maintained and except for weekends in August, or in the case of major accidents they are rarely seriously congested. Yes, you pay a toll but for getting from point A to point B they are hard to beat. However, note most autoroutes run in a north/south direction. Therefore generally speaking driving east/west will usually involve longer drive times. To check distances and driving times we find Mappy to be very good.

A similiar situation exists with the train system. The TGV fast train whizzes from Paris to the Med but again primarily north/south. There are good train services in the north east extending onto Belgium, the Netherlands and Germany.  Conversely, there is no TGV track along the south coast so a trip from Marseille to Nice for example can take more than 3 hours. To check train services use this site clic on International Guest for English version.  It is the German railway site but includes all services within France and we find it more user friendly than the French site.  Wash your mouth out Bruce.2. Climate v. Cost.  It will be no surprise to you that the further south you go the more expensive are the properties. If sun and warmth are paramount to you, then you will be drawn to the southern strip from Languedoc-Roussillon in the west right across through Provence and the Cote d’Azur region. We have to say the climate on the French Riviera is superb, very mild winters and a long summer. While the temperatures can get up in the summer, they are often cooled by breezes off the Med.  Failing that, there is always easy beach access where there is always a lot going on to amuse yourself with!

Property prices in the south have been fuelled by international buyers and through airline activity mentioned above. When we were searching in Nice we were constantly being told by the real estate agents to ‘make a decision, there will be some Italians along soon to buy this property’. We took that to be ’sales talk’ but when we came to sell in Nice it was exactly the case, as one lot of Italians were coming to view our apartment another lot were leaving!  Bear in mind that while properties in the south are ‘expensive’ compared to other regions, they do tend to hold their value for resale and short lead time sales are not uncommon.

If however cost is a consideraton for you then you may wish to investigate some of the regions near the centre of France such as Burgundy or the Loire. Other attractive areas are down the western seaboard, or in the north such as Normandy. These areas tend to have lower (colder!) temperatues but for us there is pleasure in experiencing the four seasons, observing the countryside change colour, stoking up cosy fires and occasionally watching the snow fall gently in our courtyard! Occasionally!! For climate information try this weather site.

3. Environment.  What do you want around you?  Facilities and services of a town?  A more sedate pace of a village?  Space, fields and green-ness of a rural cum countryside setting as your neighbours?  Most people seek out a French ‘countryside’ location but that is often driven by price or what is on offer in a particular area. We had a small town location in St Remy, right in the centre, where we ran a very successful B n B. Our guests loved being able to walk 40 paces to shops, cafes and restaurants. But for that, you need to be comfortable having les voisins (neighbours) all around you.           

Another factor is noise. St Remy is small with narrow single lane streets so traffic noise was not a problem. (we did have two guests who objected to 14 July celebrations!) However in Nice, although we lived in a ‘quiet’ area (real estate speak) there was sufficient traffic for the noise to be an irritation at times. Here in Burgundy we are on the outskirts of a small commune (pop. 900) and we often receive coments from guests as to how quiet and peaceful it is. Do you want a particular outlook, a view to mountains, or across water, or rolling vineyards? Some of these factors are exactly what you would identify if shifting house in your home country.

4. Income/Financial/Business. Wherever you put down your ‘roots’ it is  necessary of course to be able to put bread on the table.  Naturellement, there is plenty of bread in France, of great quality too, but it still has to be paid for. If you intend to live in France and are finacially independent, then good for you!  You must have worked very hard for many years or else you have inherited well!  But for us other 95%, who still require an income to some level, how you achieve that income will have a big bearing on where you live. If you are very smart, the ideal is an internet based business that can be operated from almost anywhere.  Such a business also has the benefit of very little overhead.

Our move to Burgundy was a compromise. (like most property purchases!) We wanted ‘decent’ climate so didn’t want to shift too far north. For her business, Anne needed ready access to Paris, Switzerland, Germany, Holland and Belgium. So good rail serves were important. For our holiday accommodation it needed a tourist attraction, Beaune fulfils that need magnificently. We liked the gentle, welcoming Burgundy countryside (and its wines!) so we stitched together all those needs and here we are!

If you plan to operate a B n B or Gite accommodation one important location consideration is the length of the tourist season. In most areas the ’season’ lasts from around Easter to mid-October. Yes, that means up to 5 months of the year without income. And the bills keep coming I can assure you!  The further south you go the better chance you have to extend your season. But even in Provence we were surprised how much of the tourist activity closes down over winter. Future Posts will delve into this more deeply.

5. Your Interests.  An obvious consideration perhaps, but one that can sometimes be given only cursory attention. If say tennis or golf is important to you, you will want to avoid spending an hour in the car in each direction. If skiing is your thing, you are likely to look eastwards towards the Alps. Those of you with green fingers will probably steer clear of Provence.  If you interest is is walking or tramping you may want to locate near to one of France’s many National Parks.   If cycling is your fancy, choose anywhere. You will never lack for company!!

An associated consideration is what services and facilities do you need?  If for example your business requires professional help, legal, accountant, IT etc then you will want to be an easy drive away from a biggish town. For most of these services we take a 15 min trip into Beaune, it has a population of 20,000.  It has become more and more common to deal with many of these types of issues remotely, but at times it can be important to get face to face with your advisors. This is certainly helpful if you are not fluent in French.

If you are concerned about medical services, then stop worrying. We have found the French health service to be impressively efficient. Access to your GP is straight forward; appointments with specialists are available at short notice; scans and MRI’s are routine; and costs are generally reasonable. (yes, you do pay for it all in taxes!!)

Area selection conclusion. While it should be helpful to ponder all of the above, we also suggest that you let your instincts run loose.  Sit in the local café and looking out onto the village square does it give you a ‘warm’ feeling?  How do the waiters/waitresses seem? Walk through your closest supermarket, do the local residents look ‘interesting’ to you? Visit the Mairie, are they helpful and enthusiastic?

And one last tip. If you are naturally cautious by nature then visit the area again outside of spring and summer. That will often be the true test as to how much in ‘love’ you are with the region. Of course if you have already spotted your ‘dream’ property, don’t waste time, just go for it!!  And as the French say, Bon Courage!!

A Bientot,

Bruce.