Bob T

Just wanted to say that after finding thisa forum last week, I have found it to be very informative. I try to help others in my area of expertise and they have helped me. I have even put a link to this forum on my blog. Keep up the good work administators.

To find a hotel anywhere, I use the website www.hotelnet.com. I've booked with them a number of times and not been dissapointed.

Gail, I am going to the Prefecture in Perigueux in the morning to try again with mine. I don't have any problem with hte power output as that is 99 bhp. I will however take (again) my C of C from the UK and when they say that it has to be a French one, I will produce the printout from their website. Let you know what happens .

My first question to you would be that if the bills were high, would you still buy the house? Your answer is probably yes. When you have the house you canreduce the bill quite easily with insulation and low energy lights etc. People who have lived in a place for years may not want change and could be happy withhtings as they are. It is not the house that uses electricity, but the occupants. Go ahead and buy it if it is what you want, you will change things anyway, so with energy efficiency in mind.

A good rplacement for GU10 bulbs is the LED ones. They last forever and draw less than 2 watts of power. They are very new at the moment and can be bought on ebay.de for around 6 euro each. Not sure about the light output thought, good for surface lighting but may not be bright enough for room lighting.

The phone line to my house is fused so I have never disconnected and have never had a problem with storms in two years.

My Xantia HDI 110 cost me around 200 euro to insure. If you are coming from the UK collect every isurance certificate thet you can find, as 5 years full no claims here counts for very little, Youneed to prove that you have had insurance for over ten years to get a decent discount. I had no problems with insurers they were very efficient.

No solution from me but I know how you feel. We live on the side of a hill, with no flooding problem, but the 600 meters of track leading to the house is owned by two communes. While one looks after it the other does not bother. Due to the snow last winter it got so bad that I changed the car for a 4X4! If you want to see what I mean then look at the blog.

I leave the Modem/router connected and turned on all the time. There should be no problem with that. One PC, connected via ethernet, is turned on 24/7 with a firewall. The other PCs are turned off at night as they are in places where the lights would annoy me.

Just about any dish and LNB (the bit in the middle) will work with a sky digibox. A French reciever can be either digital or analogue, go for the digital (numerique in French) and you will pay around 50 euro for the box alone.

Yes use the greem. As for gap, if it is a condensation area then I would fit at least 40mm of insulation behind it as this will stop any condensation forming on the plasterboard.

The ffotprint is not a problem in the south of France so you are OK there. What you need for the UK channels is a Sky digibox and the dish pointing at 28 degrees east of south. I have two dishes and two boxes, one is a French box and can pick up loads of European channels, including French ones, for free.

I think that the livebox is a piece of junk. If you do a yahoo search on livebox, you will find that I am not alone with that opinion. I have helped many freinds out by installing their ADSL connections as a hobby, and recommend that people do not use the livebox but buy a cheap modem router instead. If you look at my blog there is a section on computers in France that may be of use to you.

There is no road tax on a car or bike here in France.

Mike, It looks very nice inthe pictures that Jules emailed today. We'll have to all get together sometime.

Did you get anything in writing about the flooding? If not then I don't think that there is much that you can do. As for the Godin, the last owner will only say that it worked OK while he was there. If you put more detail in your profile someone who knows where you live might be able to help.

Amusing and  light hearted post. Reminds me of the council tax demands that used to be sent to our troops in the Gulf. How do you contact the coucil when you are in the middle of 500 miles of sand?

I have just read this post for the first time, and I sympathise with the buyer, but to put things into perspective, this is one case in thousands. It is always the problem purchases that get the limelight. In my own experience, I came to France not speaking a word of the language, and my fluent German does not help, but found a French immo, who not only supplied an English translator for the process but did many other things too. Two years ago he changed the electricity over, arranged for a phone and the internet to be connected, and still does loads for us without asking for anything in return. He even sent his wife to hte Prefecture with us to register a car in our name. I know of ywo other English families that have bought houses through him and he has treated them the same. In one case the Brit did not try to negotiate the price, and when we turned up at his office for the C de V, he has negotiated 6000 euro off the price on their behalf! I wanted some wood to build a wood shed, he told me the best place to get it from, made the phone call to order it, and then loaned me his quad and trailer to collect it. I know that he is totally honest and a very popular person in my village. If my wife does some baking, we now take some of the cakes into  the office for him and his staff. I would like to think that this gives some hope to others thinking of buying here and know that this will not help the original poster, but there are good and bad people all over the world. In my opinoin there are more legal ripoffs inthe UK (think about some of the parking laws) than there are here. I wish the original poster all the best and hope that they come to a satisfactory conclusion. I would also like to see rogue immos shamed, that would make others more confident in dealing with the many honest and helpful estate agent here. I have a freind here who was ripped off by an immo, but the immo was English and working here. I also know hundreds of English people that have had no problem. Please to not ake any of this post to be a critisim of anyone in any way, it is not intended to be that way.

Ok thanks for the website I have printed out the bit and am ready to do battle with the Prefecture now. I just hope that my French is good enough. Nice to meet you two today Julie, your bikes are on the blog, and we'll see you again.

Much better off just bringing a sky digibox with you as all the radio stations are on that. You don't need the dish as they are very cheap here.

Brian, Have you tried sending from the web page? If you click on messagerie you should be able to send from there. I don't use outlook or Explorer anymore as there are better products on the web for free. Have a look at my blog under the internet section and you will see what I mean. You can download Firefox from the button at the bottom of the blog and you will find it is much quicker than Internet Explorer.

I use a Garmin on my bike and in the car. The map database is on the computer and contains the whole of Europe. It even has every hotel, resaurant and BMW bike dealer in it. When the other companies like Tom Tom came along and tried to make cheaper GPSs they often saved money by giving only country specific maps. A good Garmin can be had for less than £300 adn they are well made units. I used to use Garmin in my flying days.

I spent 23 years wearing an RAF uniform and am glad to be rid of it. The only thing that I still use is my old combat jacket.

Gail, If you want to try again then you could look at ebay.de for a pan european, if you need a German speaker then contact me.

I would do the ceiling first, then the sloping wall. If the sloping beams are almost flat then I would be tempted to screw the rails directly to the beams with wooden packers to keep it all flat. I would use the rails horizontally. By finishing the ceiling first you can cut the plasterboard at the sloping beams to make finishing the joint easier. As for cables, I use the tree idividual cables in the flexi conduit, this makes life easier as the cables can be too long and there is no problem shoving them behind the plasterboard. If you use hangers on the sloping beams then the rails must be horizontal and the flat face of the rail must br flat against the plasterboard. If you were to try and fit them vertically then they could slide down the hangers with the weight of the board.