Property Prices in France
What can I buy for xxxxx (enter any amount here, usually a lowish sum)?
How much should I pay?
What is this property worth?
How much can I sell this property for?
These are some of the questions I get every day relating to French real-estate - for the first two questions my answers are usually something like "not a lot" and "how much have you got".
However the answer to "what's it worth" and "what can I get for it" is really very simple, it applies to anything being bought or sold - the property is worth what someone else is prepared to pay for it. Not a penny more nor a penny less. You can ask what price you like, but if you don't get any offers then the "price label" is worthless.
You can only sell something for what someone offers and you accept (and ends up in your bank account).
The magic is in finding out what that someone is prepared to pay and how to let them know what you have to sell in the first place.
For me the most important word in any transaction is "value" - the value of something very often cannot be calculated - how much is a glass of water worth to a person dying of thirst? The answer of course is that it is priceless, but how much would you sell it to them for if you were there and could exploit the situation? I like to think that I would give it to them for nothing.
===
Establishing the value of a property.
So, how can I put a value on my property for sale or what value can I establish for a property I have for sale?
The first source of information should be the Notaires own official websites -
One of these sites which make use of the actual prices properties have sold for recently is...
Immoprix or perhaps better, Their IP address this is the same site but not in frames - either way it is one of the worst sites in the world, slow, clunky and ugly - be very careful using this site as the atrocious way it is made can capture you and make it difficult to get back to where you were - I advise you to open this useful, but ghastly, website in a new window and close it when you are finished looking.
It does have many statistics and indication of price changes, rates of average price increase since 2000 and average prices for most of France
To get away from the widely duplicated and often confusing multiple priced private estate agency sites, in France you do have another choice...
Immobilier Notaires
The Notaire will have many properties for sale which are not ever offered by estate-agents.
There are many reasons for this, traditionally French people have a mistrust of estate-agents and very often will do anything they can to avoid selling through them.
As a Notaire has to be used in any sale, an owner frequently will advise their local Notaires office of property for sale. The society of Notaires has created a database of many of these properties offered for sale and you can access them through their own website.
Sometimes the prices asked represent a real bargain and they may indicate a more accurate barometer of current values.
Just about everything you need to know about buying or selling a property in France is already written - in English - some is on the official Notaires website although this is still under construction and their cost and fee calculators are not working at the date of writing this note.
As you have no choice and must use a Notaire for buying or selling property it should be relevant and accurate - but, it isn't, recent changes in tax and inheritance laws have not been updated in some of the information, so check with me before taking their advice as gospel
Real Estate for Sale
For a working calculator for the charges you can use
Calculator for Notaires Charges
===
Calculating for Investment
The simplest way of working out the value of a property for investment is to use specialist software designed to take into account the variables and come up with a value.
This one seems to be effective and is not too expensive
real estate offer generator
If you know of others please let me know and also post it on the forums of our new site at Harmony Ownership
===
Getting information about a town or village.
The key to establishing a price for real-estate is information. Internet makes this possible, but although somewhere in the trillions of pages, the nut of knowledge is waiting for you - finding it can be difficult.
One tool I use is information from this site
http://www.linternaute.com/ville
This gives me all sorts of demographic data about even very small villages - use this with Google maps http://maps.google.com/ and even with no local knowledge, you can build up a "picture" of the area - how far to the bakers shop, schooling, is the population aging, what are the property values etc.
Combine this with average property prices over the recent weeks from
http://www.pap.fr
and you can start to eliminate, or short-list, properties.
Again, please let me know of any other websites or tools to help and post this for others on the forums here.
===
The bottom line - always ask yourself what is the property worth to you - the value to you is not just the price you pay, nor the increase (or decrease) in price after you have bought it - but simply the increase in the quality of your life.
If you are affected by the opinions of others, if you wince at the sharp intake of breath when you tell your friends how much you paid, or even that you are thinking of buying a house in France - then this will affect your judgement, but is a criteria for you personally to determine the value that you place on the property.
===
Tony Tidswell lives in the South of France and writes about the property and travel business. He has created a number of very successful websites for real-estate and vacation rentals as well as a number of other Internet businesses.
These include work for the well established British estate agents on the Cote D'Azur Coast and Country and his new online business helping people find and create Fractional ownership opportunities Harmony Ownership
Write to him through his personal website, named after a village near the Mediterranean Nizas.com which has been the source of inspiration for people coming to the south of France since 1997.
How much should I pay?
What is this property worth?
How much can I sell this property for?
These are some of the questions I get every day relating to French real-estate - for the first two questions my answers are usually something like "not a lot" and "how much have you got".
However the answer to "what's it worth" and "what can I get for it" is really very simple, it applies to anything being bought or sold - the property is worth what someone else is prepared to pay for it. Not a penny more nor a penny less. You can ask what price you like, but if you don't get any offers then the "price label" is worthless.
You can only sell something for what someone offers and you accept (and ends up in your bank account).
The magic is in finding out what that someone is prepared to pay and how to let them know what you have to sell in the first place.
For me the most important word in any transaction is "value" - the value of something very often cannot be calculated - how much is a glass of water worth to a person dying of thirst? The answer of course is that it is priceless, but how much would you sell it to them for if you were there and could exploit the situation? I like to think that I would give it to them for nothing.
===
Establishing the value of a property.
So, how can I put a value on my property for sale or what value can I establish for a property I have for sale?
The first source of information should be the Notaires own official websites -
One of these sites which make use of the actual prices properties have sold for recently is...
Immoprix or perhaps better, Their IP address this is the same site but not in frames - either way it is one of the worst sites in the world, slow, clunky and ugly - be very careful using this site as the atrocious way it is made can capture you and make it difficult to get back to where you were - I advise you to open this useful, but ghastly, website in a new window and close it when you are finished looking.
It does have many statistics and indication of price changes, rates of average price increase since 2000 and average prices for most of France
To get away from the widely duplicated and often confusing multiple priced private estate agency sites, in France you do have another choice...
Immobilier Notaires
The Notaire will have many properties for sale which are not ever offered by estate-agents.
There are many reasons for this, traditionally French people have a mistrust of estate-agents and very often will do anything they can to avoid selling through them.
As a Notaire has to be used in any sale, an owner frequently will advise their local Notaires office of property for sale. The society of Notaires has created a database of many of these properties offered for sale and you can access them through their own website.
Sometimes the prices asked represent a real bargain and they may indicate a more accurate barometer of current values.
Just about everything you need to know about buying or selling a property in France is already written - in English - some is on the official Notaires website although this is still under construction and their cost and fee calculators are not working at the date of writing this note.
As you have no choice and must use a Notaire for buying or selling property it should be relevant and accurate - but, it isn't, recent changes in tax and inheritance laws have not been updated in some of the information, so check with me before taking their advice as gospel
Real Estate for Sale
For a working calculator for the charges you can use
Calculator for Notaires Charges
===
Calculating for Investment
The simplest way of working out the value of a property for investment is to use specialist software designed to take into account the variables and come up with a value.
This one seems to be effective and is not too expensive
real estate offer generator
If you know of others please let me know and also post it on the forums of our new site at Harmony Ownership
===
Getting information about a town or village.
The key to establishing a price for real-estate is information. Internet makes this possible, but although somewhere in the trillions of pages, the nut of knowledge is waiting for you - finding it can be difficult.
One tool I use is information from this site
http://www.linternaute.com/ville
This gives me all sorts of demographic data about even very small villages - use this with Google maps http://maps.google.com/ and even with no local knowledge, you can build up a "picture" of the area - how far to the bakers shop, schooling, is the population aging, what are the property values etc.
Combine this with average property prices over the recent weeks from
http://www.pap.fr
and you can start to eliminate, or short-list, properties.
Again, please let me know of any other websites or tools to help and post this for others on the forums here.
===
The bottom line - always ask yourself what is the property worth to you - the value to you is not just the price you pay, nor the increase (or decrease) in price after you have bought it - but simply the increase in the quality of your life.
If you are affected by the opinions of others, if you wince at the sharp intake of breath when you tell your friends how much you paid, or even that you are thinking of buying a house in France - then this will affect your judgement, but is a criteria for you personally to determine the value that you place on the property.
===
Tony Tidswell lives in the South of France and writes about the property and travel business. He has created a number of very successful websites for real-estate and vacation rentals as well as a number of other Internet businesses.
These include work for the well established British estate agents on the Cote D'Azur Coast and Country and his new online business helping people find and create Fractional ownership opportunities Harmony Ownership
Write to him through his personal website, named after a village near the Mediterranean Nizas.com which has been the source of inspiration for people coming to the south of France since 1997.
posted by Harmony at 7:24 PM
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