Hi, We are about to go to the Marie with a begging bowl to make changes to our house and garage. 1. We will be demolishing the garage which contains Asbestos, so need to have it professionally taken away - does anybody know the steps involved? 2. We have a Fosse Septique that probably will fail the ensuing inspection when our permis is submitted. How quickly do they expect the repairs to be done to the Fosse once it has failed inspection? 3. I have prepared some drawings for the planned extension/improvements to our dependance and taken photos according to the Permis de Construire. I don't want to pay out for an architect, but would appreciate any ideas on the submitted drawings that are more likely to work. 4. Painting the exterior on one side (where it is rendered) and pointing the other (en pierre). There is one good article here about the pointing problems. Also there are big differences on the chances of different exterior colours being acceptable or not. We live in North Creuse (Gueret). Anybody got any ideas on this ? 5. Do we use local French or local English tradesmen? My feeling is to use French, but I've heard so many sad tales that I'm not so sure. I hear that to do so means you have to get a mason for the wall, a chippy for the wood etc. etc, as it's not possible to engage a general builder. This would mean managing the operation ourselves, whereas the local English builders can do the lot. Many thanks, Charles Longechaud
