Gites: rental agency vs Chez-Nous ?

[tracy_orione]

has anyone rented their own gite through 'Country-Cottages in France' or 'Crystal Holidays'?
we are just buying a new place and we will be in the 2002 Chez-Nous brochure, but we are not sure if this will be sufficient or
if it's safer to be with a big company ,but some (eg crystal holidays), require the exclusive for bookings until the end of february.
We will be living in the area all year round, and as this will be our main occupation, we hope to have a long rental season.

Tracy & Massimo

[suzi04]

Hi again tracy!
obviously had no experience yet of this - but there was a thread in about march on this section of the forum called "letting a gite complex" that you might be interested in. They recommend frenchconnections.co.uk. I've used this site to rent a place for a holiday & think its pretty good. They advertise the place but the bookings go directly through the gite owner.

[Clare]

Hi again Tracy,

We don't do lettings, but friends next door put their gite in Chez Nous and also on the France Direct website. They are fully booked right through to the end of September and this is only their first season. They are really pleased with both.

Clare

[RogerTaylor]

Have a look at this website.

http://www.frenchconnections.co.uk/

I haven't started to use them but have found interesting property on the site.

Roger

[rreadings]

As a recent user of the online version of Chez Nous in a desperate bid to book a house for August, 2002 I was astonished by the number of owners with indifferent pictures of their properties and no Email address.

If I going to spend 800 or more a week on a converted farmhouse in the Dordogne I expect to see more than a line drawing of the house, a dozen views of the surrounding sights and a vague description of the furnishings.

It can be no co-incidence that many of the best presented properties have already been booked for next summer. In the rush to find a place I can't afford to wait days for brochures or guess at the hidden delights of some poorly photographed farmhouse.

If you decide to use Chez Nous please sell the virtues of your property. Better still invest a little money and have your own web site.

And yes I have found somewhere for 2002.

[Nasus]

The agent we bought our house through eventually looked after it when we decided to put it up as a gite. She has other properties which she and her husband look after in the area and she says that all the others have been with large agencies and all were disolusioned. When you are handling your own booking you have control of the time you want to spend there, your own agent does not take the chunk out of your money that the big comapnies do and most people are happy to sort out their own travel arrangements through the Internet. I have hired gites from these large companies and they do not give as good a service as having your own agent. I have sorted out my own advertising, as do the others people in the area, and, providing you are offering a decent property, it is surprising how many people come back or pass on the details to their friends. I would be happy to let you have copies of what we have in the way of paperwork.

Nasus