Rosyposy_2001

Yes, thank you, I have received them both now and have just emailed you back.

Hi We have just been offered about an acre of agricultural land adjoining our holiday cottage near Guémené-sur-Scorff to buy. This offer came out of the blue, and we don't have much money to spare but would like ot buy it to protect it and the rest of the tiny hamlet from the possibility of it being developed in the future. Obviously it would also add to the value of our cottage if we ever had to sell in the future. (Sincerely hope not but in today's climate, who knows!) Our chief concern about buying it is keeping it in an acceptable condition when we are not there as it is on a main road and we don't want to upset either the Mairie or the neighbours by leaving it in a mess. We visit often but, apart from 2-3 longer holidays per year, many are day-trips when there just isn't time for major grass-cutting and we only have an average lawn-mower which is not man-enough for anything bigger than the pocket handkerchief of a lawn we currently have. We need to make a swift decision about buying it which depends greatly on how much it would cost to maintain it from a distance, so we were wondering if anyone could give us even a very rough idea how much it might cost us to have it roughly cut, (to tidy field standard, no golf-course quality needed!) perhaps twice a year. I have tried some classifieds and emailed a couple of people but no replies yet. It is level ground and the vegetation is short and in good order at the moment, so does not require "jungle-clearance"! There is easy access from the road across the ubiquitous French ditch! The farmer selling is willing to maintain it and keep the cuttings for his animals, but this involves setting up a prêt à usage agreement for our own protection which has many pit-falls - 1 being that we could not use any part of the land ourselves, even for access, according to the notaire! We would therefore be happier if we could buy it outright and maintain it ourselves. Any advice/info please gratefully received! Low cost is of the utmost importance! Thanks in anticipation for your help

Yes, I think you're right, it's the same whatever the size. Still a big percentage compared to buying a house, though. Don't suppose anyone has any idea how much we are likely to be charged to have the grass cut on 1 acre of land twice a year? It's level ground, straight off the road, and the vegetation is short at the moment, so it's not a jungle clearance job! Any maintenance in between we could do for ourselves when we are able to be there.

Put like that it seems very reasonable! I think we were most shocked by the notaire's fees being half as much again! Thanks for the link, I will check it out right now! Rosemary

Possibly it wouldn't be built on if bought by someone else as the Mairie says it s definitely agaricultural land and doubtful that building permission would be given for anything larger than a garage - at the moment! However, I gather that land classification in France is prone to changing more easily than in the UK? I agree that there is a big difference in the price of land here and in France, but the person concerned spends a lot of time in France so I think he has some knowledge of it (hope so anyway!) but I think it was mainly the linking of the house and land immediately adjoining value-wise that he was considering. It would certainly be ideal for anyone wanting to start out on a "Good Life" project with a few veg and a few small animals, chickens etc.!

Hi, I posted a couple of weeks ago that we had been offered the purchase of about an acre of rough agricultural land immediately adjoining our holiday cottage in the Morbihan, and received some very helpful advice form members, so thank you for that. We have agonised and spent sleepless nights about it ever since as we do not have any money to spare, and it would involve taking out a small loan, but we were still worried that, if we did not buy it, someone else would, and might develop it, which would be very detrimental to the future value of our property, and indeed our enjoyment of it. My husband finally asked a property valuer who works in his office here in the UK, and he said that, given the proximity of the land to our property, the land, at €3000 is "an absolute gift" and would tremendously improve the value and future saleability of our house! He added that he wouldn't hesitate to buy it if he was in our shoes! Relieved by this opinion, and feeling the decision had been taken off out of our hands in a positive way, we contacted the notaire, told her that we are keen to buy, but could she please confirm that the fees for this sale would be €1340, which seemed ridiculously high (unfortunately this figure is correct!), and could she confirm that we would not lose use of the land if the farmer continued to maintain it free of charge and keep whatever he grew on it over a number of years, as we had been warned by a forum member that this could be a problem. We realise that we may not be able to afford to keep our property indefinitely as we had hoped when we bought the house, and want to be sure that we would not have a problem when it came to selling, if we ever have to, as this would be, for us, the whole point of buying the land! She has replied by email that she could draw up a "prêt à usage", which I have now looked up online, but this seems to be a terribly grey area, and one which has caused a few problems for owners in the past! I understand the gist of the document but there are 1 or 2 aspects that I am unable to find answers to online. Has anyone had any experience of this, and do you know, for example, whether we would still have any right to enter the land (we currently scuttle down the side of it to cut the parts of the trees in our garden which we cannot reach from within it and which block our view of the countryside), and to trim trees and brambles on the land we would be purchasing which are just outside our garden but which also block our view when they grow too tall? Also we toss grass cuttings etc over our hedge onto the land (something the previous owner had done for many years, probably unseen by the farmer because of the amount of "undergrowth" just the other side of our hedge but on his land!), as we often have to cut the grass on a day-trip to France and there is no time to get to the dechetterie before we have to dash back to the ferry! There is a deep ditch between our current property and the field in question, and he has never cultivated the land close to it, and for the time being this is probably the only part we would want to use for access etc as mentioned above, but as owners, would we be legally entitled to?  If not, we are unsure what the point of us buying it is, for us at least. If we had money to spare for investment then I can see the point, but if our own use is severely limited I'm not sure now whether to go ahead! We would probably always be glad for him to continue to maintain it and use most of it as we have no intention of (or funds for) ever developing the land in the future, other than to perhaps put a small garage on it for our car one day, when we can afford to. The Mairie has said they would look kindly on such an application. We shall of course try to discuss this whole matter with the notaire, who is very helpful, but given my much less than perfect French and her very good, but also less than perfect English, we are anxious not to make a costly mistake. It's a small amount of money to many people, but a lot to us, we are just trying to think of the future and what we leave to our children. Any advice gratefully received, thanks in anticipation!

Thanks for that valuable advice, we hadn't even thought about him being able to claim usage rights! We would certainly get something in writing! The consortium idea is good too, but we aren't over there at the mo, and the neighbouring owners live elsewhere, and we don't know where. Also neither of them speak English and my French isn't up to negotiation level, so don't know if i could cope with that. Unfortunately I don't think we shall ever be able to live in France, if we did I wouldn't hesitate to buy the land and make good use of it, but we are already finding it difficult to afford to run 2 houses and the fares back and forth from Plymouth to Roscoff (we live near Plymouth so no other route makes sense unfortunately) so we are really trying to think ahead to the day when we might have to sell, and whether the land would either increase the value of the house to any degree, or widen its appeal to prospective buyers. It is a small country cottage and at the moment most likely to appeal to "holiday home" buyers like ourselves. Equally if someone else bought the land and developed it, would this out off prospective buyers? It would if it was me! I think, despite what the notaire says, we shall have to just offer what we can afford and if the farmer won't accept or our neighbours outbid us, we shall just have to accept that we tried and failed. We have too many other probs at mo that also need money chucked at them! Thanks for your comments.

Hi Thank you for all the helpful replies. I have spoken to the notaire today, she agrees that the land is expensive for what it is, but was also of the opinion that it would add greatly to the value of the house if we ever wanted to sell, as we only have a very small garden, and therefore considered it worth the price to us. She said that she was pretty sure (and would check) that the farmer would be willing to maintain it for us for as long as it was not fenced off from his land, so that would take away the major worry of it getting very overgrown while we are away, and having to spend all our time looking after it when we are there. Apparently he already does this to another piece of land for our neighbours, and I think he keeps the hay in return. Those were the good points! On the other hand the notaire says that the farmer is not willing to sell just part of the land as it is a well-defined plot in itself (the large size is not so important if we don't have to take care of it all the time), but also he is not open to offers as our other neighbours are also interested and will buy it if we don't! So much for our theory that it had only been offered to us! We're a bit surprised at this as neither of them live permanently in the neighbouring houses and they aren't let out, but apparently that is the current state of play. The notaire says that it would be no problem to get permission for us to build a garage, but it is far less likely that anyone would get permission for a dwelling. She is going to phone the Mairie for us to find out what the likelihood would be. We have no intention of building a dwelling on it ever, but are concerned that someone else might. So really it is all down to us - we know that we really want the land in the light of the maintenance problem being taken away, and everyone we have asked says that it would be a good investment, but it is a major problem having to find the full price €3000 plus the fees, which the notaire says would be a massive €1340, nearly half as much again! We don't know whether to put in an offer despite what the notaire says and risk losing the land and having to live with whatever appears on it in the future, (53 houses have just been built on land at the end of our garden in England on land that everyone said nothing would ever be built on, so we are only too aware of the pitfalls!) or put ourselves in a much worse financial position than we are now (very little to spare) and risk being "taken for a ride" by paying the full price, if the farmer thinks we are a bit of a soft touch! Having said that, I understand the notaire is obliged to have the best interests of both parties in mind? We are trying to think far ahead, but don't have that many working years ahead of us to regain the ready cash needed for our retirement, so it is quite a difficult decision. (We hope to spend a lot more time there after we retire, but my husband is adamant that he will not move permanently from England!) Anyway, thank you again, I will post along the way to let you know how things work out, in the hope that it will help someone else in the future. I'm off to London tomorrow until Jan 2nd, so Happy New Year to you all, whichever side of the Channel you will be spending it on!

    Hi Everyone! We have a small property near Lignol, which we are only able to use as a holiday property for ourselves as, for personal reasons, we are not able to live in France, at least not for the foreseeable future. The farmer of the land adjoining ours has instructed a notaire to offer us a piece of his land which adjoins our garden, for the price of €3000. It is only 3696 sq metres and is very rough scrubby agricultural. land which he has not cultivated for some time, and a deep ditch runs between it and us, and also between it and the road. We suspect that this price is very high for what it is, and we would only want it for possibly building a small garage at some time in the future, definitely not to build a dwelling. There is no mention in the notaire's letter that any planning permission to build would or would not be available, so obviously this is a question I would have to ask. I have tried to find out its possible value, looked on the cadastral plan online etc, but this portion of the land does not appear to be classified on its own, although the portion of the field he is keeping is classified as P1, and in a much better state, and I can't find anything similar for sale. We suspect that he may be after some quick cash and that we are the only people he has offered it to so far! As we are able to be there many times a year (several day-trips but only 2-3 longer holidays) to upkeep the land we are wondering: a) is the price he is asking too high, b) if it would be an asset (if we had to sell our house in the future), or a millstone around our necks We are both nearly 60, so not getting any younger or fitter, and just wonder if anyone has any advice, opinions on the price, or experience of buying land that turned out well/not well, etc. Thanks very much

Yes, we each have a valid EHIC card and also travel insurance. Thanks once again for the info.

Thank you so much for all the info! As we are on holiday and not full-time residents, could we call any of the above doctors? Apart from the "flu situation" would we do the same out of hours, or would there be a special number (similar to NHS Direct, or our local doctors out-of-hours number in the UK) to ring? Hopefully we shall never have to bother anyone! Thanks again in anticipation.

Hi! Thanks for all the info on sites to visit for information on Swine Flu in France. We booked our 4-week holiday to our property in Brittany many months ago before there was any mention of Swine Flu, and having just survived (yet another!) hip operation, I could not wait to get away to our beloved cottage in 2 weeks time. I have just realised that in 10 years of visiting France, we have never had reason to call on the medical services (apart from an infected mosquito bite on one of my daughters many years ago), and that apart from ringing SAMU in an absolute emergency I have no idea how to get help. In the light of recent events, could anyone please tell me what I should do if either my husband or myself developed flu-like symptoms while on holiday?  Obviously it would not be helping anyone for us to go to the nearest surgery in these circumstances. and I am particularly worried if it should be my husband as I cannot drive (and wouldn't be able to anyway following the recent operation), and I would not know who to ring for help. Our only neighbours now live in Paris and are not often there. My French is rusty, although I try very hard, and I am afraid I would not be able to make myself understood over the phone. In particular, what should we do if the situation arose at the weekend, or worsened overnight?   I followed the link at the start of the health section to find a local doctor, but it said there was no results for the search in my postcode area, which I'm sure isn't right - we are between Lignol and Guemene-sur-Scorff in the Morbihan. I realise I should have looked into this before in a general way during the 4 years we have owned our house, but would very much like to arrive prepared for the worst, which probably won't happen, or for any other future illness where we cannot/must not just turn up at a local doctor's surgery, as I don't want to be a burden on the local community by doing all the wrong things. We cannot just postpone the holiday as UK tv is telling us that this swine-flu situation could take up to 5 years to burn itself out, and it's not practical to stay put in England for that amount of time when we have a property to maintain! I should point out that neither of us have, or know anybody who has, or has had, any symptoms of swine flu, this is purely contingency planning! Any advice gratefully received, Thanks.

Oh, is that €1,50 per month for all 12 months, or just for any months during which I use it? Still a very good bargain though! I gather Leclerc sim cards are valid for 12 months? Thanks everyone for the very speedy replies!

Hi! We live in the UK but have a cottage in Brittany which we visit as often as possible -  day-trips, long weekends and month-long stays - whatever we can fit in! I have been reading the posts about sim cards but have not yet found an answer to my question. When in France, I text my daughters in the UK several times a day, but I do not (or very rarely) make or receive calls to/from the UK. I had a French sim from Maxsim but they went out of business so I lost all my credit, and all the other sim suppliers that I have managed to find offer cheap calls and often no charge to receive calls from the UK, but nobody seems to offer cheap texts, ( at least, they are only a fraction of a pence cheaper than my UK supplier [40p per text msg] so not really much advantage). Some are horribly expensive to buy too, and only a small part of their cost goes to credit your phone! Can anyone please advise me if they know of a sim card that I can buy to put in my spare mobile phone that would give me cheap texts to the UK? I have read with interest about the Leclerc sim but the tariff for texting has not been mentioned and for some reason I cannot download the pdf file from their site. I would be grateful for any advice. Thanks[:)]

Can anyone please tell me if it is possible to pay Taxes Foncières by means of an English Visa debit or credit card please? Because EDF sent us a very confusing amended bill, I have inadvertently paid them twice, and we have also received a water bill on the same day, which has left us with very little leeway in our French bank account. As I have to have yet another hip operation in the near future we are not able to get over to Brittany to deposit more money in our account and I am loathe to pay a £25 transfer fee for a relatively small amount (€165). I was therefore hoping, strictly as a one-off, to be able to pay from the UK by credit or debit card, but from the www.impots.gouv.fr website this does not seem to be possible. We are normally very careful to keep plenty of money in our French account for such eventualities, but a whole host of sudden unexpected circumstances have descended on us in the last 4 weeks and now things are looking a bit worrying, thanks to these 2 bills arriving just at a time when we cannot be over there[8-)]! Has anyone found a way round this, please? I'd be very grateful for any advice. Thanks, Rosemary

I want to buy some new folding metal persienne shutters to go in front of our front door as ours are looking a bit tatty, but can't find anyone in the Morbihan or nearby who makes/supplies them. I've searched around on the Internet but no luck so far and noone locally seems to know anywhere to try. DIY stores don't seem to have them, only wooden or PVC ones, and we want to keep the appearance of the cottage as it is now. Can anyone point me in the right direction please? Thanks Rosemary

Thanks for the advice, I will look into Britline for the future, although when we arranged our insurance through the bank, (simply because the previous owner had the insurances for all his holiday lets there, and he came with us so he's as amazed as we are that we weren't covered for theft, guess he was just lucky nothing happened while he owned it!), we were dealt with by a very helpful bilingual bank clerk who deals with all the English customers. Obviously we just did not check that he understood exactly what we wanted from the policy and it just didn't occur to us that theft wouldn't be covered. As you say, live and learn! Sorry to hear about your problems, Moulin, as someone else remarked, it makes you wonder exactly what you are paying for doesn't it?! I actually put this on the wrong forum so I reposted it on the "Legal" one and got some very helpful replies, in case you are interested for future reference.  

We have shutters to both the front door, (which was not touched!), and the downstairs window, (the upstairs rooms have Velux rooflights), but the downstairs shutters had been forced open far enough to reach in and smash a pane of glass and then turn the handle on the locking bar. We have now had an extra bar put across the inside so that it would be much harder to force again, and shall be buying an added lock for the bar on our next visit. However, I suppose anyone determined enough would still get in somehow! On the papers we were given from Crédit Mutuel (we are with Suravenir Assurances), there are no clauses about prolonged absences or shutters or anything else, just a brief statement that we are covered for "multirisques habitation".  These "multirisques", if I had had the sense to read them properly and not make assumptions, list "Fire/similar events, natural catastrophes, water damage, Défense-Recours (??), and breakage by ice " and do not mention theft, but do not exclude it in writing either! I have since been told that it is normal for a French policy to exclude theft although it is not mentioned, you simply take it "as read"! Wish we'd known that before! We visit our property,if only for a day-trip (we are lucky enough to live only a few miles from Plymouth so can take advantage of BFs cheap offer in our local paper), on average once a month, and the previous owner, who lives in the next village, holds the key for us and passes every day, often calling in to check that all is well, so the cottage is actually visited more often than when it was owned my him as a summer let. Fortunately for us, the owners of the 2 cottages opposite, which were also broken into, are returning from Paris to live there permanently soon, so at least the hamlet will then be occupied all the time, and any break-in attempt will be more noticeable, although we are on a main road anyway, with cars passing frequently, even at night. We are trying not to let it put us off, but it does feel like our dream of so many years of owning a little hideaway in France has been a little spoilt by what happened, I don't think we shall ever be able to approach the cottage with such light hearts and anticipation again! Still, many lessons learned if nothing else! Thanks to all who replied. Rosemary

Can anyone please tell me whether they have found it cheaper or more beneficial to insure through an English rather than French insurer? Also whether anyone can admit to being as naïve and careless as we were! We purchased our holiday cottage in June, but because of a contractual letting agreement which the previous owner had, we did not occupy it until September. The bulk of our possessions were not taken over, or purchased in France, until November. To our horror, on our next visit just before Christmas, we discovered that our cottage, and the 2 opposite, had been broken into and about £1000 worth of items, mostly brand new bedding, towels and cooking utensils and new portable cd player and vacuum cleaner, still in their packaging, had been stolen. Sadly, a Lloyd Loom linen basket, a wedding present to my mother 60 years ago had also been taken, presumably just to transport the spoils, and to me this is irreplaceable. Fortunately only a small amount of physical damage had been done to the property itself. The gendarmes told us that it was most likely done by Eastern European "travellers" taking items for their own survival, plus a few luxury items to sell-on. This is apparently not uncommon. I telephoned the French insurance company, confident that our home and contents were well covered as we are paying almost 3 times as much as the previous owner, but after listing everything we could remember to be missing and sending all the receipts we could find, we were shocked to find that we would get absolutely nothing as we are not covered for Theft! Yes, with hindsight I know we were crazy not to read the small print thoroughly, even in French, but we took on exactly the same policy as the previous owner, and after all the stress on the day of signing the Acte de Vente (that's another story I won't go into here!) it got put aside and was one of those jobs we were going to do over Christmas. It never occurred to us that Theft would not be automatically covered, nor did we dream that our precious little cottage would be burgled within a couple of weeks of moving our things in! Naïve, but there it is! I have contacted our French insurers with a view to upgrading the insurance, but for future years wondered whether anyone had had a similar experience or could tell me on which side of the Channel they had found the best value insurance. I like to "buy French" wherever possible but in this instance I am very much open to suggestions! Thanks Rosemary

Can anyone please tell me whether they have found it cheaper or more beneficial to insure through an English rather than French insurer? Also whether anyone can admit to being as naïve and careless as we were! We purchased our holiday cottage in June, but because of a contractual letting agreement which the previous owner had, we did not occupy it until September. The bulk of our possessions were not taken over, or purchased in France, until November. To our horror, on our next visit just before Christmas, we discovered that our cottage, and the 2 opposite, had been broken into and about £1000 worth of items, mostly brand new bedding, towels and cooking utensils and new portable cd player and vacuum cleaner, still in their packaging, had been stolen. Sadly, a Lloyd Loom linen basket, a wedding present to my mother 60 years ago had also been taken, presumably just to transport the spoils, and to me this is irreplaceable. Fortunately only a small amount of physical damage had been done to the property itself. The gendarmes told us that it was most likely done by Eastern European "travellers" taking items for their own survival, plus a few luxury items to sell-on. This is apparently not uncommon. I telephoned the French insurance company, confident that our home and contents were well covered as we are paying almost 3 times as much as the previous owner, but after listing everything we could remember to be missing and sending all the receipts we could find, we were shocked to find that we would get absolutely nothing as we are not covered for Theft! Yes, with hindsight I know we were crazy not to read the small print thoroughly, even in French, but we took on exactly the same policy as the previous owner, and after all the stress on the day of signing the Acte de Vente (that's another story I won't go into here!) it got put aside and was one of those jobs we were going to do over Christmas. It never occurred to us that Theft would not be automatically covered, nor did we dream that our precious little cottage would be burgled within a couple of weeks of moving our things in! Naïve, but there it is! I have contacted our French insurers with a view to upgrading the insurance, but for future years wondered whether anyone had had a similar experience or could tell me on which side of the Channel they had found the best value insurance. I like to "buy French" wherever possible but in this instance I am very much open to suggestions! Thanks Rosemary

In the hope of helping others who need some info about the "new" type of contract which our notaire told us is replacing the Tontine Clause in popularity, here is the link to the place where I found most ot my information: http://www.frenchentree.com/fe-legal/documents/DepinnaFrenchInheritanceAndTaxPlanning2003.pdf Scroll down to page 9 of the pdf file for info about the "Hague Convention contract" or "La Communaut Universelle (Marriage Contract)" section for advice that we found very helpful, as we did not have the foggiest idea where to start and were terrified of signing the wrong thing. Several people have contacted me following my "a big thank you.." post, and I really don't want to tell people the wrong thing, or give the impression that I know a lot about it. Everything we based our decision on came from the above-mentioned article and from a very helpful notaire, we just struck lucky with her! I can highly recommend the practice of Maitre Olivier ARENS at Gumen sur Scorff, near Pontivy, we dealt with Mme Gaelle GRAVAT and her PA, Mme Sandrine Grard. I cannot speak highly enough of everyone at the practice, especially after all the horror stories we had read about some of the notaires elsewhere. Good luck to everyone thinking of buying in the near future! Rosemary

I would like to post a big thankyou to all those who first answered my request for help and advice a few months ago when we started to seriously hunt for a cottage in France - we arrived back in England today after signing the Acte de Vente on our dream holiday cottage! When we first started dreaming of a holiday cottage in France we did not know where to start - I posted a message asking for help and received so many messages from other readers, and the help was just invaluable! After 10 years of dreaming, and a few months of serious searching, we returned home yesterday with the documents to prove that we are now the proud owners of a lovely cottage in Brittany, completely renovated and just waiting for us to visit as soon as possible. I cannot thank Living France forum members enough for their help, concerning everything we should take with us, from the necessary papers to deposits etc. without which we may well have missed a golden opportunity to own our dream holiday home! It was originally something we thought we would never have the nerve to try, but with help from so many lovely people, we have done it. Strangely enough, we had no problems on the French side, all our problems came from delays in being able to access our own money, and on the last day, with the company who were supposed to transfer our funds and did not do so at the requested time, so that we did not know until the day we arrived in France to sign the final contract whether our money would be there, thus turning what should have been a wonderful experience into the most stressful 24 hours you can imagine! I will not name names, suffice to say that it was one of the biggest exchange firms who advertise with Living France! Anyway, after many emails, faxes and phone calls, the money arrived on the day we were due to sign and everything eventually went through. Please do not be put off by stories that notaires are not helpful - I know we were very lucky, but our notaire could not have done more! She spoke fluent English at all times and every document was printed in both English and French, so that at no time did we feel we did not know what we were signing. On the final day of completion , as she could not be present, a translator was provided so that we were aware of every detail of the transaction. (Incidentally, we bought our house under the terms of the Hague Convention, which cost us only 275 euros and was worth every penny for the peace of mind!) I would be glad to recommend the notaire to anyone who wishes to know where to go. A word of caution for those just starting out, we first saw our property through one of the web-sites who specialise in "hand-holding" throughout and after the purchase, but later found the same place through searching for notaires' web-sites. Not only did we save ourselves 2000, we also discovered that the owners knew absolutely nothing about this person and had no knowledge that their house was being advertised in this way - apparently this is common practice with French properties, but do not be fooled into thinking that all these people have permission from the owners to offer the properties, and often they do not full access to all the details about the property you are interested in. At the time of writing, the property is still on this person's website as being for sale - we know different! Once again, I would like to make it clear that this was an independant person, and I am NOT referring to people like the "Grannies", who I understand have helped a lot of people, although I have have no personal experience of them. A final word - if you prepare yourself well, and take all the advise the forum members have to offer, you CAN do it, never give up, you WILL find that dream cottage eventually, no matter how scared you are when you begin to search, and no matter how little you know when you start out. Hope to see you there one day! Thank you again Forum members, for all your help!