nimportequoi

I do quite a lot of telephone teaching now too. I think the advantages for students/companies is that it is cheaper and for me I don't have to use any fuel to travel to lessons. However, I'm not sure on the overall effectiveness of this method, I think it is easier to teach face to face and the students learn more than with telephone lessons.

Paolo, We called from an English mobile number, not my French phone to make the call, just to be on the safe side!

When we got our freeview cards for the gites in May this year, we could only get all the freeview channels by giving the system details of every digibox and the specific card number to Sky. The BBC channels came through immediately without activation, but for ITV, Ch4 + 5, they did not work until the activation had been carried out by Sky.

Ron, my Mairie didn't have any of the forms, but got them for me and sent off all the documents I provided. I only live 40 mins from the préfecture, but there was no suggestion of having to go there myself. I have a very good Mairie despite the fact it is only a small commune. So some do help!

Le Jars, I am in a similar situation to the one you describe. I have a business and also work in France and pay cotisations here for myself and my daughter. My partner and I jointly own the house in France, but he works for a UK company and has another small house in the UK. He comes home (to France) every other weekend. From having spoken to my French accountant, he said that if we were married, my partner would have to pay tax in France and the UK (i.e his income would have to be taken into account for my French tax return). He would then be reimbursed for the tax paid in France, although I think this is a time consuming and complicated process. As we are not married, so there is no problem with him paying UK taxes and me paying them in France, our incomes can be considered seperate.  

My mairie knew nothing about changing from a UK licence to a French licence, but took the time to read up on it, gave me the appropriate form and specified what was required and told me to give all the documents to them, they would process it with the préfecture. I guess it just depends on how helpful your Mairie is, Ron.  

Fantine is right, an abri is far more efficient at keeping heat in a pool than the blue bache. Although there is an initial outlay (ours is a low abri which cost 7000€ last year) it has a 10 year guarantee, whereas the blue baches have to be replaced every 2 years (at a cost of about 400€). In addition to this there have been huge savings in the cost of electricity for the heat pump, which has hardly been on this summer. When I opened the pool in mid April, after a week the pool temp had gone up 10°c to 24°c. It is 26°c at the moment and I am in Northern Brittany. Its a lot warmer in the pool than out of it!

Are you sure you farmer neighbour has adequate insurance? Ours doesn't for third party damage and his cows have been on our lawn a few times - luckily when it was dry, so no damage done - yet.

I agree with everything that has been said too. I teach English in Brittany and got my qualification through a correspondence course before I left the UK 3 years ago (which cost about £200). However, it was really the fact that I am a native English person and have a business degree and work background in the UK that have enabled my to find work out here. Although I live in the country and get some teaching work in primary schools, the majority of my adult teaching is from large companies in Rennes. It is only from the work there that I get a reasonable income to supplement my gite business, in rural areas no-one is bothered about learning English. I got my first job out here by going through the Pages Jaunes and sending out my (French) CV to every language school in the area. I also contacted the local Education Nationale in order to get an 'habilitation' to teach in primary schools. It may be worth contacting your local CCI as well - they often run BTS and various other courses, some of which which contain an English module. You will be doing well to get 15 hours a week work out of teachiing English. Most language schools pay 13 - 22 euros per hour, although some universities pay a lot more.

Arnold, I have chosen to opt out of Chez Nous and advertiese on a large variety of internet sites instead, some of which are Holiday-rentals.com, FC, holidaylets.nets, Abritel.fr and a couple of other French websites. I have received far more bookings and more importantly, out of Peak bookings from doing this, for about the same expense of one decent size CN ad. Therefore 100% of my bookings come from the internet. I think Chez Nous is too big and there is no way of refining your search except by area. My ad is still on their internet site, but this is not as good as others as there is no way owners can update their availability themselves, you have to phone them, so not really very practical!

Good point about putting the cleaning clause in the Ts and Cs. This year, after having been left an uncacceptably dirty and untidy house after the May half term, I added a reminder of this as an extra clause in the information pack under the departure heading, saying "please note that any additinal cleaning costs will be deducted from the security deposit". Whether it is that, or the fact that all our guests have been great this year and would never leave any rental house where they stayed in a state, I have not had any problems with the way in which properties have been left since.

We only have one 'bathroom' in our 3 bed house which has a shower, no bath. If it had a second 'bathroom' I would definitely have a bath. However, just having a shower has never been a problem and a baby bath is always provided for babies. I was thinking of taking out the bidet, and putting in a bath with an overhead shower. However, now I'm not sure if this won't cause problems for older people with mobility problems as it is a lot more difficult stepping into a bath than a shower cubicle. Another advantage of showers is that they use less water, so it is more environmentally friendly and costs the renter less! I think Catherine S is right, there are a number of different factors involved in choosing a rental home and if everything else is right, the bathroom setup won't be a major issue.

In our information pack I ask guests to leave the place in the 'clean and tidy' state that they found it, including the outisde dining area, also to strip the beds. I do not expect them to leave washing up for me to do, although I don't mind emptying a dishwasher. I also prefer rubbish to be cleared (we had a nasty experience with nappies in a dustbin during a hot week - maggots everywhere!). However I don't expect guests to clean fridges, ovens, bathrooms, windows etc. Its nice when the grandparents stay - the houses are always very easy to clean afterwards. The best guests are the French who always leave houses immaculate, there is virtually nothing to clean afterwards!

Use PoolRX, a mineral sanitiser (silver, zinc and copper to control algae). I used to have terrible algae problems, even though I checked the ph and chlorine levels regularly. I've been using it since the beginning of June and had not had algae since, despite some very hot pool temperatures. I buy mine from my pool supplier, but you can get it on line cheaper, if you want more details the website is www.poolrx.com It really does work and it is such a relief not having to worry about recurrent algae and put in algaecide all the time!

Same as Catherine S - 0% of real problem guests over 3 years, and we have lots of children (and the occasional pet staying). But I live on site and would be able to see any extra people / unauthorised pets etc. I have never had anyone not pay. Zeb, what is the point in not cashing a deposit cheque - the guests could easily cancel it before you have time to cash it and take the money for any damage caused. It's not worth anything if it is not cashed!

Just be careful with the companies who do the treatment, some are a bunch of crooks, especially those who phone up, say they are in the area and will do a free estimate. I had a free devis from one once, who told me all the longere was infested with capricorn and should be treated at once. Having then spoken to some French friends, they told me that it was common for companies like this to take advantage of people and frighten them into treating the wood, when in fact in a lot of cases, the woodworm is no longer active. My house has been 'bien mangée' in the past, but the wood is so hard now that it would be difficult for anything to be active inside. I know I have a problem in one gite within the longere, as there is wood dust evident in April and May, when the woodworm are active. I'm going to treat this myself. As for the rest, I have always assumed - no dust, no problem - I hope I'm right!!

You are entitled to be registered as a micro-bic if your turnover is less than 76,000€. You only have to be registered with the RCS if your income is above 23,000€ when you are then considered as 'loueur en meublé professionel' instead of 'non professionel'. You are then obliged to pay the social cotisations. At least that is what my French accountant has told me!

I'm so pleased we got UK TV in the 3 gites, no-one has complained, on the contrary, I think everyone has watched it. Although they have the option of watching French TV, most speak very little French so there is very little language capability to improve on. For me personally, its almost a pleasure now cleaning on a Saturday whilst being able to listen to BBC radio. Not sure my French cleaner est d'accord!

I don't think British locataires are used to the carrelage, so unforgiving on all crockey and glasses compared to a typical carpet. In addition to this, the likelihood of dropping a glass is worse after drinking alcohol, which  of course, most people do a lot of on holiday in France! I get far more breakages of glasses than coffee cups.

Thanks Arnold, that is very interesting info! I totally agree that the French to pay as little as possible, they are quite happy to squeeze as many people into a gite as possible, no regard at all for the comfort level! I've noticed that a lot of French gite owners are now asking an amount per person per night instead of a rate for the whole house - of course if there are 16 people instead of 12 they do use a lot more water etc. However, they do provide me with a good winter income and always leave the gites immaculate. Good points about the sheets and towels, for the gites a double set is all I need, I don't know where I would store any more than that! And locking the kitchen door, the kitchen always takes the most cleaning. Only problem is with my properties they can't get in or out without going through the kitchens, so I maybe I better have a re-think after all. Susan

Arnold, Out of season I do get and take bookings for single nights, not just whole weeks, especially to French people. Not as many as a B&B would though! I was interested how you manage to combine the gite and B&B business as one of my gites is a large property which is difficult to let outside holidays and weekends. Do you have to have all the rooms en suite and are there other B&B regulations which you would have to apply to the property? At the moment, running gites leaves me free to work in the week, but I agree with what you say that the space needed and consequent maintenance and upkeep involved in gites makes the profit margins a little slim compared to B&B.

I tried it last year, but found it an expensive waste of time, plus it seems to be a very unprofessional site. You pay £1 whenever you respond to an ad from a potential customer, regaredless of whether or not a booking was generated.  I spent a lot of £1's, but never got one single booking, whereas the traditional advertising of customers answering my ad has always worked very well. I think people genuinely looking for a holiday will do the leg work in responding to ads and making enquiries themselves, there could well have been a lot of time wasters and even dare I say bogus ads that were posted on the site. There are a lot of excellent advertising sites out there for gites, you pay up front, so you can control your budget and they bring in the business.

I just wanted to give an update, have been using the PoolRX mineral sanitizer for 6 weeks now, not a sign of algae, the pool is crystal clear, and I am very happy with the product. For anyone (like me) who maintained their pool to the book and found it still got algae too regularly, I can recommend it.

If you open up your home to paying guests, then you have a duty to respect their feelings. After all, it isn't as if they are there all the time, and anyway, a lot of them don't mind dogs. If you do restrict their freedom little, it doesn't mean you mistreat them. When I go to work, they are in the house all day, but they get a good walk before and after. In the summer, when we have people in the gites, they would much rather be in the cool indoors than outdoors. You have to respect people's feelings in this matter if they are paying to stay in your home. My dogs are happy anyway, even if they do get confined to barracks occasionally! They still get fed and walked (normally further than normal) and as long as they are with me, they are happy!

We have 2 border collies and a Jack Russell and 2 cats, they follow me everywhere (except when there is a BBQ!) but if we have guests in who are afraid of/allergic to dogs, I try and make sure that the dogs stay inside. They have plenty of exercise, they have 2 good walks a day outside of the grounds, but guests have to take priority. I had one child who hated dogs at the beginning of last week, by the end of the week she loved them, so it can have a positive effect, but ONLY with the agreement of the parents. Really, if people book a cottage in the country, they have to expect some sort of contact with animals. I would say the majority of guests (many of whom have left pets at home) absolutely love the fact that there are dogs and cats here.