will 4 gites support my family 24

[Chriswaters]

Hi
we are in the final throws of buying an old farm in the Dordogne approx 10 km outside Sarlat. We chose the area as we hope along with it's appeal to us it will attract a high level of rentals.
We are a family of four and this will be our only income. It will consist of our house plus 4 two bed gites of high quality.
We will be living on site and are looking for between 20k to 30k per annum to cover our living costs. We have no mortgage and have funds to convert the buildings and survive for two to three years with no income.
I guess at the end of the day we are committed to the project what ever your comments, but i would appreciate some feedback
thank you

[Nick Trollope]

LAST EDITED ON 28-Jun-04 AT 07:55 AM (BST)

I'm afraid only you can do the maths. There are number of members of these forums who will tell you it is impossible to survive on tourist income alone. I'm not so sure. I suspect that it is difficult to judge the prospective level of bookings for 2005 at the moment, let alone 2006+. As your entire income dependant based on something as fickle as tourists, your research will need to be comprehensive.

However, consider the following (in Euro's!!);

25000 pa = 37,500 pa (at the moment, but who can tell?)

Season of (say) 16 weeks - others will know better.
(say) 75% occupancy - ditto

So, 37,500 (income) / 16 (weeks) / 4 (gites) / 75% (occupancy) = 781 per gite per week. Will the market sustain this?

I am not in the gite business, having decided (by checking all this out) not to be - our gites lay fallow whilst we cast our seeds upon more fertile ground (no, I'm not a Christian, either, I just like the cliche). But I have been in business for a long time & (as I have said before) would not undertake any project without plenty of research.

Whatever you decide to do though, good luck & above all, enjoy yourself. There is little point in being here & not doing so.


Nick
http://www.aplaceinfrance.com

Although I would also consider the point made by Fontremy, in this forum.

[Moorejw]

If your gites are fully insulated and have central heating then you might enhance your income with some longer winter lets. We have found a great demand in this area (17) from house-hunters and people wishing to try out the area, or just escape from the UK winter for a few months. We are planning to support ourselves (only two of us) with 3 letting units sleeping a total of 14 people, with pool and large area (2 acres) for recreation. We will let at least one in the winter to keep the cash flow ticking over.

John and Angie Moore (17)

[Val_2]

There is an interesting article in June edition of French Property News by an agent who is actually declining to sell Gte businesses at the moment because of the downturn and saturation in certain areas - very informative to those thinking of going down this route with no previous ideas of what they may be letting themselves in for. I liked his comment that people who have half a million euros or more to spend don't need or want to work for a living and don't need gite businesses and the locals can't buy because they are too expensive.

[Lf]

To add my little bit - do you have a realistic idea of the conversion costs. I do a lot of estimates for this sort of thing and only a very small percentage get beyond the estimate stage. Estimates are usually in the 300,000 euro bracket and that does not include the cost of furnishing and appliances.

We've been running our gites for 12 years and whilst the number of bookings has gone down over the years (much shorter season these days) our net profit has increased mainly because the level of re-investment has dropped.

Regards

Charles
http://www.lesflamands.com/hr