Things,you,should,know,about,r travel,insurance Things you should know about retiring to France

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Things you should know about retiring to FranceAbout five years ago, having spent many happy holidays in various parts of France we decided to look for a holiday home to which we could eventually retire. The first area we looked in was the Tarn. The scenery here is lovely, unfortunately the estate agents photographs and descriptions were somewhat misleading, and, the sad thing was, having travelled many miles to view, we were disillusioned.An area we had always liked was the Royan area, but property prices here were just too high, so we tried the Corbiere hills area between Carcasonne and the coast. Once again the scenery was lovely and, after finding several properties which were of interest we decided to buy a large empty house in a small hillside hamlet. Lovely views, lots of potential and we agreed to the vendors price.We spent several days taking photographs and measurements but had to return to England before the notaire was available for us to sign the sales contract (compris de vende). So, we made a date for the following Friday. Having booked and paid for our flights back to France we were rather upset to get a telephone call on the Thursday from our English speaking agent, to say the vendor had sold to someone else.This was our first indication that when you are told something in France it does not mean, in any way, that it is going to happen – read on !After a few months we decided to look again, and began our search on the internet. We found what looked like a lovely house set in a large tree filled garden about 9 miles inland from the Gironde estuary, just south of Royan, so, full of enthusiasm decided to have a look.The web-site was run by an English estate agent working within a French agency which made the language situation easier. He showed us several houses but we liked the one we had seen the photographs of  and encouraged by his comments that the Charente Maritime had its own ‘micro-climate’, was the second sunniest part of France, and that there really was no winter; it just went from autumn to spring.Well, when you have set your heart on something you will believe anything – we should have remembered this was a french estate agent speaking !The vendor offered to include the commercial garage next door at an adjusted price, and as this gave us about 2 acres we agreed a deal, and, after about four months it was ours.Lots of land may look very attractive, especially when the grass is short and the trees are in bloom, but it can look less attractive when you return to your holiday home and find a 2 acre jungle of waist high grass!So, after some consideration we decided to sell off the commercial building next door and about half the land with it. This was the easiest property sale we have ever done. A handwritten notice in front of the garage and we had three offers within a week. The first one was the usual time-waster you find everywhere but the second guys were genuine and we sold which gave us money for continuing our development.So now it looked like we were all set, and all we needed to do was get the services re-routed as they went to our house via the garage building. In the UK this would not present a problem, and when, in late 2005 the water board asked us for over 1000 Euros, to put in a new meter and all we would then have to do was to get a registered plumber to connect to the house (50 metres), we agreed and paid up.Our cheque was cashed and after several calls to SAUR, the water authority we were told the work was imminent. The service was eventually provided two years later, in December 2007.So, it was December 2007 and, as I had retired we decided to sell our UK house and move to France for a year to see how things went. This we did, and were fortunate to get quite a quick sale on the UK house before the dreaded ‘credit crunch’ played havoc with the market.Fortunately we had an agreement with the new garage owners for water during this period, but, unfortunately when it came to paying the old meter costs we discovered that our new neighbours had not been as careful as we had in water usage, and had in fact fractured a water connection in their land. The result was a massive bill for water used, and, as the water board had not yet provided us with the new service they insisted we had to pay it in full. Our neighbours seemed quite happy with this arrangement and it took the intervention of a sympathetic mayoress to persuade them they should pay half.The telephone was a similar story. As our house had telephone points fitted France Telecom allocated us a new landline number in February 2006, and we mistakenly thought this meant we could now have a connection. We were a bit surprised when our new telephone did not work, and, after discussing the problem with France Telecom they decided they would need to do a survey as our property was now classified as a ‘new house’. The cost of this survey was to be 664 Euros and we had to agree to pay before any installation would be done. Well, we had no choice as the cost of my French mobile with calls to the UK was not good news.A date was made for the survey whilst we were still in England so a friend kindly waited for the France Telecom person to arrive. He did not come, so I called France Telecom from the UK and arrange another meeting. Nobody came to this one either.We waited until our next visit to France and did manage to meet the France Telecom survey person. He arrived, looked at our house from the road and departed five minutes later. (so much for my 664 Euros !)All this took place well before our move to France so we really thought we would have a telephone connected for our arrival in December 2007. You’ve guessed it – no telephone, but, being on site it should now be easy. The France Telecom representative promised us the line would be connected within two weeks, one month at the most. I had had such problems with FT that I asked the mayoress if she would speak to the representative and confirm the connection time – she kindly did this and it was as stated. We were promised the line would be in before Christmas anyway.The connection was eventually made at the end of April 2008, and we were given someone else’s number in error which resulted in another weeks delay. Our line was finally activated on May 2nd.The electricity board were rather more efficient and actually connected the supply when they promised.It is now 2009 and having completely renovated our house we are so fed up with the general attitude here we have put the house on the market. Oh! - just in case we were thinking everything was sorted, the wine season started and the new silos were being delivered. Last month the telephone line was cut three times. The contracted technician told us that they should have used 10 metre poles and he would fix it. I am still waiting in eager anticipation, hoping that the line gets raised before the next high load. So what lessons have we learnt which may help others who may be considering retiring to France?The so called french ‘LAID BACK’ attitude is another name for ‘UNRELIABILITY’Be aware that registered french tradesmen have to pay a lot in insurance and taxes each month, even if they are not earning, so prices tend to be high. The standard of work however is usually good.Before we moved to France we made the mistake of allowing a French builder who was doing some work for us to stay in our house with his family for three months over the winter, whilst his own house was being completed. The agreed cost was 600 Euros per month plus electricity. When it came to pay time he suddenly had no money, yet seemed to be spending a lot on his own house, so, cutting our losses we agreed that he would ‘work off’ the money by doing work for us. He did about three days and then disappeared, never to return. The lesson we learned from this episode was that when someone says to you they are going to do something, all it means is that their mouth is open!When you think you have calculated how much you are going to spend on restoration - double it.When you think you have calculated how long it’s going to take you – double it.If you think the cost of living in France is cheaper than in the UK you are under a misapprehension. The exchange rate has changed things dramatically.If you hope to live on a UK pension, remember it is going to be worth far less now than it was a year or two ago.Do not rely on the fact that there may be other ex-pats in the area. They may be totally involved in trying to make a living and have time for little else or may move in a totally different social circle and have little in common with you.So, there are lots of negatives and we may have been unlucky, and I must admit that, in the warm weather it is lovely to just relax by the pool or in the shade of the many mature trees in the garden, but in retrospect, I think our first idea of having a holiday home here rather than a permanent residence, would have been a better bet.