Dave Ozzie

Hi , is there anyone on here who could offer their opinion on the whole gite business aspect. Is there anyone here that currently runs a gite business in France?
We want to buy another property local to the property we are currently buying in lower normandy. I know some people do it just to make some extra cash, and ive noticed on booking sites that generally the gites are booked in and around the summer.
But can you lease gites out all year round ? obviously youve got to market it properly and price it reasonably , and you have to know what the holiday makers are looking for in a GITE but is it a reasonable thought that perhaps run properly you can earn an adequate income from gites,
Im not going to rely soley on the income as i want to the handy man / grasscutter / maintenace man, {im an electrician here in England}

Whats your thoughts???
regards
Dave

Tweedpipe

If you do a Search/Advanced Search here for 'Gite' you will find many posts which discuss this.
I've been reading here for a number of years, and so many folks appear to agree that it's very tough to make a living in the Gite business, one reason being that frequently a half or more of the total revenue goes to social charges, before one even starts on running costs.
That plus the general recession and increasing unemployment in France and elsewhere, with folks tightening their belts on vacation, leisure time etc.

However, I'll leave it to those with more experience in this domain to comment further.

Ka Ora!

We have run a gite for most of our time here, Although we sold it not so long ago as we are relocating. Certainly not a big earner occasionally we got requests for out of season stays but they are rare. With Gites it's not the quality of them you are competing with it's the sheer quantity of them here. As an income and if you only have one Gite them I would say max 35 percent of you annual income could be earn from one in a good year.


Also there is no need to format the questions you ask in the fashion you do, It doesn't make them any easier to read, It is better to highlight the odd word in bold not a whole paragraph

Dave Ozzie

Some negative feedback there so far.
Already looked on past posts and found nothing that helps answer my questions.
Is there anyone who runs more than two gites on here in Normandy that has anything positive

dmu

Hi, I can't help re earning a living with gîtes, but from reading threads on the subject, I agree with what Tweedpipe says above.
Going on a tangent, if you are "currently buying", you can't have started working as a handy man. I would concentrate on that side of your activity before investing in a possible white elephant. Apart from finding enough of such work to keep your family, you must register in the Chèques-Emploi or Auto-Entrepreneur system for Social Security coverage. If not, and you work au noir, then you must take out adequate insurance for healthcare coverage for your family. Do you speak French? As Tweedpipe mentions, the unemployment rate is VERY high in France and you'd have to compete with French jobseekers if you want French clients...
Sorry to be negative, but that's the current situation here.

Dave Ozzie

It's the same as here in the uk then! It's a vicious circle you have to be living in France before you can work there. We will come out of this world wide recession that's for certain. Jobs here in the uk are now getting few and far between

dmu

Whilst waiting for this to happen, it might be wiser to buy your property and use it for holidays, and "enjoy" all the social benefits that you get in the UK that you wouldn't get in France. You might get Family Allowances since you have two children (the princely sum of 127,05 € per month), but you'd need to get into the System to receive them and provide a ton of paperwork.
You haven't asked, but for a family of 4, you'd need to have a regular take-home income of about 1500€ per month to survive. This is an official figure called the "poverty level" and needs to be considered when contemplating doing irregular work with two young children dependent on you.
Good luck, whatever you decide!

loy loy

I'm assuming that's without housing costs!

We researched gite and thought against it, not only are the taxes really high, I read there are 5 gites for every one person looking for a holiday. And you need at least 3 to get close to making a living.
On a personal level, if I were looking for a holiday in France I wouldn't pick Normandy, I would pick much further South to increase chance of Sun. Obviously not everyone is after sun. Perhaps a Gite offering specialist cycling, golf holidays etc would be better, offering food too. Something to stand out from the crowd.
Again like everyone said, without the language and the qaulifications finding work will be difficult. Unless there is a high expat level in the area then language wouldn't be so much of a problem, but whether there is enough work on just expats to keep you going is another story.
Even self employed the socials and tax is high, I'm at 40% at the moment.

dmu

[QUOTE=loy loy;9986733]I'm assuming that's without housing costs!

QUOTE]

Yes, sorry, I forgot to mention that this doesn't include rent/mortgage. I also forgot to mention that the above sum doesn't include a Mutuelle (top-up insurance) which is most advisable for reimbursement of what the S.S. doesn't reimburse (and with two young children, this could become expensive without a Mutuelle....). A private insurance could, of course, cover all healthcare costs (not included in the above sum...).

Dave Ozzie

[QUOTE=dmu;9986783] Oh well that's that then ,I will remain a slave of this sinking ship, thanks for the honest feed back , I'm surprised there's any expats ,of there's so many problems... Take care

loy loy

I wouldn't give up. Just research and prepare.

there are lots of difficulties but also lots of joys. It's still the best thing we ever did I just hope it works for us, we're still very early doors ourselves.

smithyandlisa

[QUOTE=Dave Ozzie;9986819] I think if you are prepared to throw in the towel that easily, then a move to a non English speaking country is probably not for you.

Good luck with your choices.

Dave Ozzie

[QUOTE=smithyandlisa;9987082] Let's be Honest I haven't exactly had any positive feed back, and I didn't say I could not speak French!! I get by very well!

smithyandlisa

[QUOTE=Dave Ozzie;9987219] And I'm not trying to be negative, just honest. Moving to another country, with or without the language is a tough move.

When we moved here 4 years ago, we left 2 children aged 24 and 20 at the time, gave up 2 fabulous jobs in London, sold our home and came over to France, which incidentally we had only visited once previously for 2 weeks.

Eveyone we knew advised against the move. All the 'negative' advice we received was absolute common sense, and I would have been saying exactly the same to them. I had taken 'O' level French 35 years earlier and never spoken French again, my hubby didn't know a single word, and we moved to an area of France with so few Brits, we have only ever met one couple in more than 4 years.

We dropped on French shores and actually rented a gite, found and purchased our home and went to school to learn French. I am now an autoentrepreneur and my husband works too. We have a great social life, every one of our friends is non English speaking French and life is great.

So how about that for a positive post.

The point I'm trying to make is that we were determined. No amount of negative (however true) comments would have deterred us from our goal. I don't think the comments on here have been negative, just honest.

If you make a move to any foreign country, It's going to be hard work, and an uphill struggle. You are going to get knocked back, and have so many problems and frustrations that your head will spin. But when you start to gain ground, and the pieces of the puzzle start to fall into place, the rewards are amazing.

In summary, you have to REALLY want to make the move. If a few less than perfect comments on a forum are going to crush you, then I stand by my earlier comment, that perhaps this is not for you.

Once again, good luck with your choices.

Tweedpipe

Excellent reply from smithyandlisa.

Dave Ozzie,
Some positive advise for you to consider:-
If you really want to make your future in France, either in the electrical autoentrepreneur role or gite business and are absolutely determined.... then do it. There can only be 2 possible outcomes.
- You succeed, and will never look back, and thank the day you took that decision.
- Or, after several years of giving it every possible chance, find that it didn't work out - return to square one. You will have accumulated experiences never to be forgotten, you'll definitely be speaking improved French, and certainly have the satisfaction of knowing that at least you gave it a try, and not burdened by the frequently reoccurring thoughts of 'What if?'
Convince yourself that you will make it work, and it probably will!
Bonne chance.