Well the dog barked again and I went outside expecting to see another tank. No, this time it was actually the postwoman!
I'll be flying out in two weeks for a few days so will find out if they let me back into France on my return. Hopefully it will be my last flight, the final trip planned will be in my van to empty the last stuff from the house and hand over the keys. Three and a half years we've been trying to sell. The fault of the three estate agents who all dramatically over-valued it. Fortunately the experience has been invaluable, because houses here are rubbish and end up costing the foreign buyers a fortune to restore and in many cases they run out of money, fall out and split up. The current exchange rate means we have lost nothing fortunately and can now spot a money pit immediately. Problems typically are damp, flooding, very poor condition, asbestos roofing and chronic over-pricing. Work over here takes a long time to get done and is over double the price it would be in England, simply because the system sees artisans taxed on gross income not profit and they have to pay registration charges annually. Typically restoring a house would take over 5 years, even if you were French. If you can't do the work yourself you are likely to lose a lot of money when re-selling. The buyer pays 7% for the estate agent fees and 8% to the notaire for the conveyancing, consequently people rarely move and it is difficult to find buyers if they do. Many houses we have seen have been on the market for over 5 years and no realistic chance of ever selling unless, as sometimes happens, a foreign buyer gets taken in by the agents sales pitch. So far we have dismissed hundreds from their spec, viewed 40, definitely dismissed 39 and so have only one possible subject to price. This is after over two years viewing in this area.
