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Regardless of your financial situation, buying property in any country is a considerable and complex undertaking. That's not to say we don't recommend it (of course we do!), but it’s important to know what you’re letting yourself in for before you start scouring the Properties for sale section. At the very least, you should have given some thought to the following questions:
> Which resort(s) do you want to buy in?
> What kind of property are you considering?
> How will your property be used?
> What are your expectations regarding return / income from your purchase?
> What will the property’s running costs be?
> Where will the money come from, and how does the sale process work?
The answers will likely be very interdependent, and if you can draw up a shortlist for each one, this will help narrow your choices. Some things to think about:
Which resort?
For most people this is the easiest question to answer: you’ve always enjoyed your holidays there, and now it’s time to get something a little more permanent. However! Spending a week in a resort is very different to spending several weeks or months there.
Will the resort provide enough variety to keep you happy when you’ve been there for a long time?
Are you likely to get bored of the skiing there, or the climbing or hiking in summer?
What are the resort’s long term development plans?
How easy is it to get to and from the resort?
Are the locals receptive to foreigners?
Will you need to speak French to integrate into the community?
If you plan to be there outside of standard winter or summer months, do you know what happens in the resort in the off-season?
Will the resort suit your family and friends, or others who might use your property?
If you have children, will the resort be suitable for them?
If you don’t have children, you might do in a few years time!
If you plan to rent the property, when are the resort’s busy times?
Click on the 'which resort' tab, above, for our descriptions and information on all the main French ski resorts.
What type of property?
It may be that you’ve always dreamed of buying a rustic chalet in a peaceful corner of your favourite resort, or renovating a beautiful old farmhouse in some idyllic mountain village… at the same time learning a new language, enjoying a more relaxed pace of life, skiing every day of the winter, and then making a fortune from the resale.
Sadly, the reality is often somewhat less simple. How much time do you plan to spend in your property, and how much work would you be able to do in it yourself? How easy would it be to find local building help? Living through an Alpine winter can be very hard work, and with a large property your time is likely to be largely taken up shovelling snow off your drive…
It may be that you’d be better off with a 'lock up and go' apartment which, while it might lack the pastoral charm, wouldn’t require nearly so much care and attention. And the pipes wouldn’t be so prone to bursting. And your attic wouldn’t be such comfortable mouse refuge in the summer.
Some French info:
Apartments in France a referred to by a letter and number code which serves as a rough guide to their size: T1, T2 etc up to T5. Simplified a little, these refer to the number of rooms – so a T1 is a studio, a T2 is a one bedroom apartment (ie a kitchen/living area, called a ‘sejour’, and a separate bedroom), a T3 has a sejour and two bedrooms, and so on. In practice there is some greyness in the definition as regards having separate bathrooms and toilets, and separate kitchens and living areas. Also, in the north of France these are more commonly F1, F2, but in the Alps the ‘T’ is standard. Contrary to what some would have you believe, there is no difference between ‘T’ and ‘F’ – it is just a question of where you’re from!
Below is a quick rundown on the pros and cons of different types of property.
Starting Small:
Studio or 1 bedroom apartment (T1 / T2)
Size: 20-28m²
If you've holidayed on a budget in any French resort, you'll be familiar with these. Generally part of a large 1970s apartment block, and often optimistically described as sleeping up to four people (!), this is what you should expect from a French studio apartment:
Typical Layout:
Front door opening into a corridor, alcove with a bunk bed. Corridor leading to kitchenette (coin cuisine) and main living area with sofa-bed or pullout (clik-clak). Bathroom and toilet usually separate. Small balcony.
Ski storage is often a locker in a shared ski-store room on the building’s ground floor. The 1 bedroom version (T2) would have a small separate room, around 8-10m² - often this is made simply by dividing what clearly ought to be one room into two by putting a thin wall down the middle. Some apartments also have a 'mezzanine' – a very good way to increase you floor space by having a raised sleeping area… but don't expect to be able to stand up!
The main advantage of this type of property is convenience and the ease of use: you can literally turn off the lights and walk out at the end of your stay. All of the building maintenance is covered by your quarterly coproprieté charges, which normally include the heating, hot water, as well as shared area cleaning, building upkeep and maintenance etc. This is of course also very handy if you live there full time.
They may lack charm, but if your budget is limited and/or you're looking for an easy life, then this is the way to go. All resorts have properties like this, although some ( Les Menuires, Les Arcs, Chamonix) have more than others, and prices are therefore lower. Their main disadvantages are a normally unpleasantly outdated decorative scheme, and – obviously – lack of space. However, they can be made very inviting with a simple 'Ikea' makeover!
Note: you may also come across a ‘T1bis’ – this is a double-studio, effectively the same as a normal studio but rather more spacious.
Medium sized apartments:
2 or 3 bedrooms (T3 / T4)
Size: 28-45m²
2 and 3 bedroom apartments are probably the most in-demand properties to rent out and to buy, and they are perhaps also the best size for investment purposes. Sadly this makes them the hardest type of property to find, and those that are on sale are often subject to wild overvaluation – in some instances you could probably buy a small chalet for much the same price.
However, the general appeal of medium-sized apartments does mean that, particularly in large resorts like Chamonix, enterprising French corporations are building new apartments left right and centre. For details see ‘MGM-style New Builds’, below.
Older versions of these apartments are often found in the same buildings as the studios and 1 beds (see above). If so they are likely to be cramped for their size (70s designers were weak at optimising space) and largely-charm free, unless you find one which has already had a recent overhaul. As with the studios though, being in a big block affords them all the ‘lock up and go’ advantages of being part of a larger entity.
Medium-sized apartments can also be found in smaller buildings and occasionally as part of a converted chalet. Though even more rare, these properties are a perfect mix of convenience and Alpine authenticity – they will still be run as part of a coproprieté (generally comprising the owners of all the proerties), so you won’t have to worry much about maintenance, but you’ll probably also have a garden, a sloping roof, a smoking chimney…
Buy-back / leaseback schemes
If you plan to buy an apartment with the intention of spending some time there yourself and renting it out when you’re not there, buying on a leaseback scheme may fit perfectly. In brief, you buy your apartment from one of the French property giants, like MGM – and as part of the purchase agreement you agree to spend only a limited time in the property yourself. the rest of the time MGM rent it out, which means you don’t have to worry about it. Generally you would agree to only 3 or 6 weeks in the property youself, and those weeks are regulated (so you can’t just spend Christmas, the February half-term and Easter in your place and expect MGM to sort out the rest of it!). A typical setup would allow you one peak week, one mid-season week, and one low-season week per winter, and then three weeks through the summer.
The financial incentive for you depends on what option you choose when you buy. You can either go for a reduction in the purchase price, or a guaranteed rental income every year. Agreements run a standard 10 or 11 years. The ins and outs of these agreements can be a little confusing – give us a call and we’ll talk you through it.
Chalets:
The typical Alpine dream is of buying a chalet – big wooden beams, roaring log fire, outdoor hot tub, champagne in the cooler and a four course meal on the table… this is of course largely born of having stayed in chalets on ski holidays, when someone else was providing the food and drink and keeping the hot tub clean and keeping the fire going. Owning any large property involves a lot of maintenance – and owning any large property in a location which regularly sees temperatures drop below -20 involves a lot of heating, a lot of insulation, a lot of snow shovelling… a chalet can be very hard work, unless you also intend to employ people to look after it for you. But if you’re ready for all that, chalets can be found often for little or no more than the price of a decent-sized apartment. Unless you want the hot tub and sauna and 40-inch flat screen TV and so on – there is basically no upper end to how much a chalet can cost.
A typical medium-sized (4-bedroom) chalet would comprise: ground floor entrance leading to hallway & boot/ski room. Lower bedroom & bathroom, garage and/or storage room. Stairs to main living area with fireplace, open plan kitchen, toilet, large balcony. Stairs to main bedrooms, two medium-sized and one large master bedroom with en suite bathroom, also separate bathroom.
Properties to renovate:
As with property anywhere, renovating can have a significant impact on price at resale. Renovations fall (roughly) into three categories:
‘'Ikea': not necessarily dependent on the Swedes, giving an apartment an Ikea makeover simply means buying nice some nice modern-looking bookshelves, a coffee-table, and maybe changing the curtains. The most immediate effect of an Ikea makeover in raising a property’s rental price. Given that most property is sold unfurnished, this kind of renovation isn’t likely to have much affect on a resale price, aside from giving a pleasant impression during viewings.
'Changing Rooms': this mid-range kind of renovation involves repainting everything, upgrading kitchen appliances, potentially knocking through the odd wall here and there… generally re-fitting to make things feel larger, lighter, and more modern. It can have a very noticeable impact on the value of an apartment or chalet at resale, and equally can make a place far more comfortable to live in while you’re there.
'Junkyard Challenge': this is the complete re-hash, new floorplan, bring-in-the-builders sort of renovation which effectively involves gutting a place to a shell and starting from scratch. You might consider this if you like the size and shape of something, but not much else… a complete overhaul is an expensive and time-consuming job, but it is also the kind of thing that can transform a cheap run-down property into a million-euro chalet.
Whichever of the above renovations sounds like your cup of tea, Planet Subzero can take you step-by-step through the process. We can give you initial advice while you’re finding a property (or if you’re thinking of doing some work on a property you already own), we can put you in contact with reliable workmen and point you in the direction of good suppliers, or we can simply organise the whole project for you. Just ask us.
Buying Land
These days this is really only possible in a small number of resorts. The local mairie (like a town council) for each area imposes a limit on the amount of development allowed, and most resorts have reached that limit – hence the trend for renovating existing properties. Les Menuires still has some space available, but aside from there you are likely to have to look slightly outside of your favourite resort. There’s space in the Chamonix valley, some in and around Mégève, and of course away from the main resort centres you can find land to develop with relative ease… but from finding land and getting planning permission, to ensuring that everything is in place to survive a winter, organising architects, builders, plumbers, painters, and so on, buying land is an enormous undertaking. But Planet Subzero can make your end of the work relatively hassle-free. Let us take you through the process and make your development dreams come true.
How will your property be used?
Running costs
Money
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