buying a holiday home in france

[dottyann]

please can someone clarify what are the legal requirements to complete a private purchase in France,do i need an english solicitor and what will i be paying him to do and what sort of cost will be involved our seller has already made us an appointment with the notaire and is organizing all the relevant inspections on the property in preparation for our visit next week am totally in the dark!

[ali-cat]

I think it's up to you - if you want an English solicitor, or not.  If the Notaire speaks English (I'm not sure if the language issue is a problem, for you) he should do everything for you.  We didn't have one - althought we bought through an Immobilier.  We did, however, use an English surveyor.

[cooperlola]

Ali-cat is right, you do not need an English solicitor, and in fact if he is not cognisant of the laws in France, he will be of little use - but some cost!  If you are unhappy with the Notaire whom your sellers have chosen - particularly if you have said lingo problem - then you are quite at liberty to choose your own.  With only a short time to go, I would certainly recommend that you take proper legal advice.  Once you have signed that compromis de vente (sp?) you have not got long to back out!

Have a very good look at this

http://www.notaires.fr/notaires/notaires.nsf/V_TC_PUB/ENGLISH-HOMEPAGE

[Pads]

We brought our house last year using the same notaire as the seller, our Estate agent spoke very good english and came with us each time we went to the Notaire to translate every thing we had to sign and read all the paper work to us.

All went well in the end and we are now very happy[:D] 

[powerdesal]

We bought a couple of years ago, didn't use an immobillier but went directly through the notaire. His clerk spoke "some" English but a translator was arranged (we paid) and everything went smoothly. I believe that a translator is actually a legal requirement for non French speakers.

The clerk / assistant even found us on our campsite on Saturday evening to inform us that our offer had been accepted - imagine that happening in UK!!!!! Lots of wine was drunk to celebrate.

The bank (CIN) were more than helpful and the only problems were caused by the innefficiency of the Woolwich in Guernsey. The France end were superb.

It does obviously help to have even a basic grasp of French.

[mint]

dottyanne

be VERY VERY careful.  we too bought from an individual.  the mistakes we made included being too eager to please the seller and going along with their choice of notaire and "so-called" interpreter.

we did engage a specialist solicitor back in the uk.  he was less than useless although he advertises frequently and designates himself an "expert" in french property purchase.  we probably did need a solicitor from the uk (just not our solicitor) as we were not too sure of things like what we could put into the clauses suspensives.  the next time around, we would definitely dispense with our own solicitor.  incidentally, i posted here recently in reply to someone else and, if you do go down the route of a uk person, you can expect to pay £1000 to £1500 (no VAT applicable)

we didn't need a surveyor as my husband is a chartered building surveyor and town planner.  that meant we bought the house fully aware of its defects and we took a detailed look around the surrounding area.  also, we spoke to some local landowners and looked at the development plan for our commune.  on balance, if you are not too sure of what you are buying, i would say that it's probably better procedure to have a surveyor rather than a solicitor; that is if you are having to watch the buying costs

as someone has already said, you could always engage your own notaire and this is one thing that we didn't do that we deeply regret.  we will be buying some extra land soon and THIS time, we will definitely choose our own notaire (one that speaks english and has been recommended to me on this very forum).  it's not that we don't speak french but we definitely do not understand legalese (in french or english or any other language!)

anyway good luck.  please feel free to pm or email if you wish me to tell you more about our particular experience

[cooperlola]

You are right about the translator, powerdesal, I had to do this the other day for some friends (although for renting).

[Will]

There is little point in using two notaires, unless the originally appointed one is known to be inefficient, incompetent or corrupt (not as uncommon as you may think). Notaires are basically government officials and supposedly impartial, acting for neither buyer nor seller, but ensuring all legal aspects are taken care of and all taxes etc paid. An extra notaire, unless necessary, will not cost extra but can add to the already considerable time and bureaucracy involved with buying a French house.

As a private buyer you will not have the benefit of an agent to translate and advise you (in most of France the buyer pay the agent so the agent works for you rather than the seller) so you may need to pay for translations. People can come unstuck with private sales, there may be reasons why agents etc will not touch the property (you might be buying a place that needs conversion to turn it into a habitation, and permission may not be forthcoming) - so you need to know what sort of questions to ask the notaire. They will answer questions, but not always volunteer information. You will need to specify certain conditions for the sale, such as to make sure a positive certificat d'urbanisme is granted. So it may be a good idea to engage an English speaking adviser, not necessarily a notaire, jut somebody who knows French law.

[Jacqui Too]

Dottyann

We have just completed on our first holiday home in France. We bought through an immobilier who by the way has been wonderful[:)] we put in our first offer when we were over last sept. but it took until end of Oct. to have it accepted, the agent sent all the first contract which including several clause suspencives that we wanted regarding gaining planning permission for various work to the property. We flew back at the beginning of Nov. we had the whole contract translated as our French is not up to that level and we signed. We were given the end of Jan as a completion date. Ten days before the completion date we received the draft completion contract [8-)]and it was at this stage that we decided that we wanted to have it looked over by a English solicitor mainly to assure us that it was ok even though we would be having it translated on the day, we thought it would be to late if something was not right. We used a well known solicitor that also is a legal expert for a certain French mag. She charged £500 to translate and go though it for us, she liased with the notaire on several important maters and made sure that we had everything in order for the completion

I was told that they charge aprox. £1,700 for a complete job start to finish. We felt it was worth £500 to have peace of mind when we were unsure of the full content of the contract, we wouldn't do it here so why do it in a foreign country

Good Luck

[mint]

i think your £500 was a very good price indeed, especially as your solicitor seems to have done a good job and served you well.  your last sentence makes me think of the exact same remark made by a fellow-househunter (got to know her through the net househunting, never met her before), "we wouldn't do it here so why do it in a foreign country."  we were just unlucky with our so-called expert solicitor, that's all.

now that we know the ropes, i really don't think we'll have our own solicitor again although it would depend on the purchase.  if it's straightforward, i would now have the confidence to go it alone but if there are complications, i would still like to have recourse to some good legal advice.  after all, understanding the actual language in the document is one thing but understanding all the legal implications is quite another.

the one question we did ask ourselves was, if it all went pear-shaped, how much of the money could we afford to lose?  just the deposit, all of it?  with the answer to that in mind, we then proceeded knowing that we had done all we could to minimise the risks; at least the risks as we perceived them to be.