An Englishman Abroad

jacaru_2

My husband has just got £30.000 from his pension. He us also due around the same from his share in the sale of his Mums house.
We are considering using the money to buy a property in Brittany. This would be our holiday home and somewhere to rent out. In four years time I can also get a lump from my pension. We would then think about moving there. What are your thoughts? We rent in this country with no way of being able to afford to buy over here due to our ages and work situations.

theartfullodger

As he's got £30k from pension presumably he's decided he'd rather have the money now than have a higher pension. Are you happy with that?

Are you in receipt of any benefits - eg HB/LHA?? Such savings or indeed a property, anywhere in the world, has an impact: ensure you inform the authorities.

What training have you done or books read on being a holiday-home landlord in France?? How much of an expert in the subject do you feel??

fishpond

Not sure what you would get for circa £60,000, in Brittany or anywhere else?
Or is this just the deposit, if so where would the mortgage payments come from?

jacaru_2

No mortgage. There are some smaller properties already renovated for less than 60k. We have only just started researching and part of that research was asking the question on here. We aren't on benefits but crappy jobs that pay the rent and give us just enough to live on.

ognum

I know nothing about buying in France but can say some generic stuff about holiday homes.

Always rent long term for a year or so before you buy in an area so you know what it's like over four seasons.

Do you speak the language?

How will you manage the letting?

Are you aware of the tax implications of owning in France

When you are retired will you always want to go on holiday to the same place?

When you own a holiday home it is no longer aholiday when you go there it will involve paying bills, doing DIY and other stuff you do at home.

I own a holiday home, I am aware I am lucky but I would not do it again, nor would 90% of the people I know who own them.

Never invest money in a foreign country you can't afford to walk away from it the going gets tough!

agrinnall

Have a read of Towny Hawks' A Piano in the Pyrenees, not only is it amusing it describes some of the pleasures and perils of property owning in France.

eddddy

Hi jacaru

Also, make sure you understand French Succession Laws.

If you (and/or your partner) have children, French law will dictate how your property is divided amongst them, when you die. You cannot override this with a will.

If this is not what you want to happen, you can do creative things like buy the house in a company name rather than your own name, etc. But you probably need to take specialist advice etc.

harrys_dad

What will you live on if and when you move to France?

moneyistooshorttomention

I understand and sympathise with your dilemma.

So your options then would appear to be:

- buy a house in a cheaper country (ie France)
- the other option of buying a cheap house in a cheap part of Britain (eg some of our Northern cities)

First option gives you a decent house. Second option would give you a starter house and possibly a grim environment.

The downside of buying in a foreign country would be a different culture. If you think British workmen/procedures/etc are inefficient (I certainly do - and am free to say so, as I am British) then French ones are deemed to be a lot worse.

Even moving within your own country (ie to elsewhere in Britain) can result in a few people thinking you aren't in your "own place" any more and not quite accepting you and you need a degree of confidence to remember that you are still in your own country and getting on with life as normal.

I would be wary of moving to a different country - because then I would be a foreigner living in someone else's country and I would regard it as necessary to learn the language if I had emigrated and adapt to their ways (something that's not necessary if you're still in Britain, unless you wish to do so).

Something I've noticed - just in moving within Britain (ie an English city to a Welsh town) - is that what I took for granted as obviously the way of thinking etc that predominates in Britain as a whole isn't. I just assumed that our way of thinking is confident/questioning/middle class values/etc/etc wherever you are in Britain. Since moving, it has become clear to me that this was just the way of thinking in the area I lived in and not a "Britain as a whole" way of thinking. The differences would be much bigger in another country.

So, how would you feel about having to live a different way of life and learn a foreign language?

Grumpygit

My parents bought a static caravan on a caravan park about 1 hr south of St Malo. They spend approx 9 months over there then return home for the main winter months.

Whilst a static isn't everyone's idea of a good home, they are actually roomy yet cozy, all the facilities and they are on a friendly site where the statics are away from other caravans/tents, it is owned by an Englishman and there are other english people in other statics - they have more of a social life over there than they do at home.

We have stayed at the caravan next door to them and all I can say is wow - i would definitely buy one!

It costs them less to live over there than it does here (in Guernsey) and they are both living off pensions.

You would have to look very carefully about where you would go, as (with any place in any country) there may be locals who don't like "foreigners" living so close and therefore make you wonder what you have done.

Most people are friendly and living somewhere different with a different language is part of the fun and it's not as if it's the other side of the world.

I'd say go for it - if you're renting now you've got nothing to lose, however, I would maybe say don't rush into buying if you don't know the area or the people.

sheramber

Why Brittany?

Do you have experience of the area you are looking at?