Advice needed for renting property Nr Bayeux

[Michelle]

Hope someone can help. We are in the process of having a house built near Bayeux. Initially we wish to rent it out before making more use of it in about 5 years time. The problem is that we live many hundreds of miles away and visiting the property ourselves will be difficult. If anyone can give us advice on any aspect of renting out the property it would be gratefully appreciated. Things such as rental agreements, caretakers, gardening, general maintainence, effective advertising etc.

[Causette]

Hi Michelle,

Congratulations on your new build home. Bayeux is lovely, and a tremendously popular area for rentals, so you should have no trouble finding clients from that point of view! As long as everything else is right, of course

When we were researching how to market our cottage, I studied all the likely places - books on life in France; lots of Internet rental advertising sites (we used French Connections - but there are loads of them); brochures such as Brittany Ferries which offer gite holidays etc. I also drew on our own knowledge from our years of French holidays - what we liked, what we didn't; I asked friends and family for thier views on what makes a good holiday home - and of course, there is absolutely LOADS of helpful information on this forum under Gites You'll also need to think about the admin side - insurance, taxes, whether you'll do the marketing or employ someone else; employing someone to do the changeovers/cleaning/gardening...

I think if you determine the market you are trying to attract (French? English? American? Couples? Families with youngsters? They all expect different things!) and plan accordingly, you'll be on the right track.

I like to think we must have got ours about right, as we have been full almost continuously since we opened Jun 03 - this year is full until the end of October (when I start my 4 day short breaks offers), and we have 5 weeks booked for 2005!

JudyM