Wannabe ex pat looking for advice please.

[Roverload]

Hello / bonjour! Looking for some advice, we're a young family of 5, no hope of ever getting a mortgage for a house big enough to raise a family in the uk. I've had a good look at the French property market, worked out how we will make it work lifestyle wise but the finances are something that's still up in the air. My other half finishes uni in 3 years, she's in her third year training to be a teacher and speech therapist. She wants to teach in a montisori school when we move, I want to work the land and run bee hives. Should we stay here and save while we're established here or is it possible to mortgage from here? Or is it best to just rent a place, get any old job and get stuck in learning as we go? We have much to learn and I'm all ears.

Things I really need to learn:
Local rates.
Schools.
Bills.
Any other expenses that we don't have in the UK?
Common mistakes.


Ian

[paulwirral]

Rent first , learn the language , don't be blinded by what property you can buy for seemingly little money , it's cheap for a reason !
Labour costs are high in France .
I've seen a few people come unstuck by getting in way over their heads , oh , and now you've expressed an interest you'll no doubt be offered a few renovation projects by your new best English friends !
Keep a sense of reality .
Good luck

[Russwhitehouse]

You also need to figure out how you will earn money. The good life and self sufficiency won't pay the phone bill and electric bill. Don't be under any illusion, you will not "get a job" as the French will not employ you, so you will have to row your own boat in some way, or as some folk do, commute back to UK for work stints.
Everything paulwirral has said also needs to be heeded,especially your new best friends with a slightly desperate glee min their eye.

[smifffymoto]

Also if you do buy a falling down country pile and do it up your self with out using artisans when you sell the capital gains can be eyewatering.
It can't be stressed enough as Russ says,work from the locals will be very scarce.Life in the country can also be very hard and very lonely,choose where you live carefully and do your research.

[Dand E Lion]

Also, be aware that if you set up a business and need to employ anyone, even your missus, you will have to pay circa 40% of their salary as 'social security' - it's hugely expensive to employ anyone in France.

[magooagain]

Is capital gains payed on a principal residence when sold?

[rdjohn]

All the above sounds like good advice to me.

The only positive I see in your plan is that renting some land to keep your bees on should be cheap. Selling the honey could be a bigger problem. French consumers want to know the provenance of any high value food product. Being produced by a Brit from the wrong department could be about as bad as it gets. People in the country live on SMIG incomes and so will buy the cheap stuff from LeClerc

Property in towns will be more expensive. Do your wife's qualifications work for France? Even if the answer is yes, is there a good reason why they should prefer to employ a Brit, rather than a local? Equally, when you kids grow up, they will speak perfect French, but if they want to live locally they will find that nepotism will get in the way of getting a decent job. Youth unemployment is huge at the moment. It is why I hear so much of it being spoken in the streets of Manchester, right now.

Bee keeping sounds like a perfect solution for later life, when the nest is empty. Being retired in France is pretty damm good.

HAPPY NEW YEAR to everyone

[smifffymoto]

magooagain said:

Is capital gains payed on a principal residence when sold?

Bloke I know bought a 2 properties with another couple,they did them up and lived in them very happily for a number of years.The deal was if one couple wanted to sell the other couple would sell as well and sell as a job lot.

Each couple has been saddled with a 33000 Euro tax bill

[smifffymoto]

I should add that one couple is returning to Blighty.
This is also a very important consideration when "estate planning" as your children could be saddled with a massive tax bill upon your death.The Impot start wanting their tax money about 6 months after so then the pressure is on to sell. If you want to buy a house always ask the family history as it may be a "forced sale" because of tax demands.

[magooagain]

smifffymoto said:

Bloke I know bought a 2 properties with another couple,they did them up and lived in them very happily for a number of years.The deal was if one couple wanted to sell the other couple would sell as well and sell as a job lot.

Each couple has been saddled with a 33000 Euro tax bill

I have read up a bit about it now. It seems there is no capital gain tax to be paid on a principal residence .

[Roverload]

Thanks for all the responses, you've given us a lot to think about. The beauty of my other half's plan is that a lot of Montessori school want English speakers as their first language, there are very good resources for teachers who want to work abroad, we do however accept that there is no point in buying a property until she's is securely in a job, I will probably continue Valeting self employed for a while until the house is as we want it. I feel I should be clear on the plan, it is through rose tinted glasses,co do want people to poke holes in my plan as the more problems that get pointed out now will result in me perhaps not making any colossal mistakes. All I've ever wanted to do is grow my own food and live like a hobo. Odd, but that's just the way I am and always have been. Hate working for money, hate the fact I have to have money. Cheryl on the other hand has only ever wanted a good job that she enjoys for reasons that I won't go in to. The idea has been that now the kids aren't so little, cheryl goes to work and I assume her role at home, thus freeing up the time for me to grow food, honey etc to eat and trade. I do understand we will still need to buy food etc. we want a house with a bit of land, 4 bedrooms, can be a bit tatty as long as the walls and roof are good I'm happy, I have a deal with a friend who makes windows and conservatories so new windows and a used good condition conservatory are taken care of. We want solar heating and panels to reduce bills, the idea is to make the house cost as little as possible to run, we won't buy until we are in a position to do all these improvements. We need to be in brittany or Normandy so we can get back to Cornwall easily and family can get to us easily. I have a deal with a couple of local farm shops and I'm talking to my former employer (a fruit and veg wholesaler) about the possibility of exporting the honey to him. But to be fair, the honey is at this point, more of a hobby.

That's the "in a perfect world" plan. Poke holes by all means, but all I ask is don't slate me for being a bit of a hippy. I know I sometimes walk around with my head in the clouds but I have put a lot of thought into it and many a late night discussion on this idea has taken place. Once again, thanks for the responses so far. I have much to research!

Ian

[magooagain]

Good luck with it Ian. I am sure you can make the life you want here in France. The Barter system works well in France.

Just remember that windows open inwards here!

[leyorkie]

In my experience Valeting is not so common in France and definitely not in the rural areas.
Check out the Pages Jaune for the area that you are thinking of and see if anybody is currently providing a service.
Most ex-pats I know are retired and the ones working are not as well off financially as they would be in the UK. The "Good Life" approach is OK but there will be times when you have doubts.
Good luck.

[rdjohn]

I take t that your wife is aware of this website http://montessori-france.asso.fr/home-page/annonce...

The good news is that there seems to be in excess of 200 vacancies being offered right now, and only 6 people seeking employment.

I don't know if this is common, but our local secondary school teaches English in French, so bi-lingual may be essential. We discovered this from a 14-year German exchange student who was confident that his English was better than the English teacher's. At least you both have 3 years to work on your French.

[Roverload]

magooagain said:

Good luck with it Ian. I am sure you can make the life you want here in France. The Barter system works well in France.

Just remember that windows open inwards here!

Thanks, will remember that. I was going to be cheeky and see if I could stretch him to tilt and turn windows! I use the barter system in Britain with some success, keeps my cars serviced and mot'd!

[Roverload]

rdjohn said:

I take t that your wife is aware of this website http://montessori-france.asso.fr/home-page/annonce...

The good news is that there seems to be in excess of 200 vacancies being offered right now, and only 6 people seeking employment.

I don't know if this is common, but our local secondary school teaches English in French, so bi-lingual may be essential. We discovered this from a 14-year German exchange student who was confident that his English was better than the English teacher's. At least you both have 3 years to work on your French.

Great website, she hadn't seen that one. There's a Montessori course you have to do to work in France, but you do that whilst working at the school on a trainee year. It would be sensible also to do a year or two working in that environment here before we go. Seeing as prince George is apparently going to a Montessori school I think she's well placed to get in there before the inevitable flood of people jumping on the band wagon...

[Roverload]

leyorkie said:

In my experience Valeting is not so common in France and definitely not in the rural areas.
Check out the Pages Jaune for the area that you are thinking of and see if anybody is currently providing a service.
Most ex-pats I know are retired and the ones working are not as well off financially as they would be in the UK. The "Good Life" approach is OK but there will be times when you have doubts.
Good luck.

I'm sure there will be doubts occasionally, I'm under no illusions that it will be difficult at times but if I apply my daily mantra of "prior preparation prevents pi$$ poor performance" I'm sure I will be pretty well prepared. Been toying with the idea of employing somebody here to continue the running of my business, it wouldn't provide me with a great deal of money but it would allow me to keep a back up plan if it all goes wrong. But it wont go wrong if I'm prepared! I do quite a bit more than valeting so I don't necessarily have to stick to just that.

[magooagain]

Roverload said:

Thanks, will remember that. I was going to be cheeky and see if I could stretch him to tilt and turn windows! I use the barter system in Britain with some success, keeps my cars serviced and mot'd!

The main reason about the widows is that you need access to close and lock the exterior shutters from the inside after which you then close the window. It won't apply if you have electric rolling shutters but will still need the traditional Windows though.

Flexibility is important when trying to earn a living here. Just make sure that you are registered for the various work you intend to carry out.
There are various regimes that you register to work.