Top 10 tips for moving to France

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http://www.southerntimes.net/Top-ten-tips-for-moving-to-France.html

I found this article from searching online... seems a bit old (2004) but still modern enough for being relevant advice.

Hope this can help some of you moving.

Here is the first advice from the article:

"1. Accessibility - If you are not going to move to France full time you need to think seriously about how you are going to get backwards and forwards, as well as how your tenants are going to get to your house if you’re thinking of letting it out. Beware of buying a property close to a small airport where only one discount airline operates. What happens if it goes bust? Try to

find somewhere with several options. The ideal is a mixture of a small

airport, the TGV and an international airport not more than an hour’s

drive away. Being in the middle of nowhere is all very lovely, but not

when it’s a fifteen hour car journey from London."

cheers...

[Will]

The article is by Helena Frith-Powell, who is, to say the least, not popular among users of this and other forums. So you can expect some disparaging comments...

Having said that, speaking as one who has been there and done that before helpful advice from such articles and this forum were the norm, it's generally pretty much spot on. Personally, I think No8 is a bit misleading - there's nothing to stop you instructing a second notaire as part of your house purchase transaction, but the thing H F-P forgets is that notaires work for the state, effectively as tax collectors, rather than representing the buyer or seller. If you need to look after your interests, then you would do better with a UK solicitor specialising in French property and inheritance law. Though many of these are often (justifiably) compared to chocolate teapots. Whichever option you go for, a second lawyer will often slow down an already pedestrian procedure even further.

The biggest change since 2004 is, of course, healthcare. Which H F-P doesn't even mention, apart from an oblique reference to the costs and frustration of running a business (which has been made somewhat easier, in theory at least, with the introduction of the autoentrepreneur scheme).

[juliec]

'For example, in most cases, when you sell your house in the UK, once you are a resident in France, you will not have to pay capital gains tax on it.'

....in the UK, but isn't it the case that you have to pay CG tax in France?

[Sunday Driver]

Beware of tax advice that was written six years ago.......[;-)]