Re: Another cry for help!!
 

Emily, stop it, pleeeeeease.:)

Re: Another cry for help!!
 

I think we had a quote from a UK insurer (because at that stage you couldn't get a quote for full cover from a French insurer). It was £4000 pa for the two of us and didn't include cover for heart attack or stroke for OH, because he takes tablets for high blood pressure. We opened a micro-entreprise instead. We have made very little money out of it because of the high cost of cotisations, but we have full health cover.
Sorry OP, I'll stop now.

Re: Another cry for help!!
 

Emily, if you work in the system, then health cover is available, but you would still benefit from a top-up insurance from a Mutuelle. I recall ours (for two) is about €70 pcm, so €840 pa.The earlier line about E106 and 2.5 years, take with a very large pinch of salt. I doubt one would get two years. At some point you would need to consider a EHIC (European Health Insurance Card) from UK. Research and read is, without doubt the best way forward.

Re: Another cry for help!!
 

Not me that is asking the question CJM! We have been here since 2005, had two full years from an E106, then suffered from the fact that the new health care regulations of 2007 first said that existing E106 holders would not be allowed to join the CMU. They then changed the ruling 3 weeks after we had started our business.
None of that really helps the OP though, who will have to open a business or get private health cover after their E106 runs out.
Our mutuelle top-up health insurance costs 120€ a month as it keeps going up as you get older.

Re: Another cry for help!!
 

could well be as we looked into it once and it was extortionate!!!:blink:

Re: Another cry for help!!
 

Emily A is right. It's always been 65 for men. It's based on the state pension age of the EU country you made yor contributions.

By the way anyone in the UK ca fnow forget a bus pass party when they reach 60. Bus passes are now on a sliding scale - the same as the changing age for UK womens' state pension

Re: Another cry for help!!
 

Provided you have an adequate NI record then it's perfectly possible to get 2 years, or even 2.5 years, out of an E106, it all depends on when you apply. The E106 is now called an S1 by the way.

Timing is all. E106's run from Dec to Jan so if you applied in January then you would get a full 2 years, apply in June though and you only get the remainder of that year plus the next full one, a total of only 18 months or so.

The 2.5 year E106, which is the absolute maximum possible, is a product of the above plus your NI record for the current UK tax year. You would need to speak to the DWP to determine both your eligibility for this and the optimum time to apply.

Be careful with private insurance, it must be FULL and COMPREHENSIVE and if it falls short by excluding certain conditions will be deemed non qualifying when it comes to your 5 years legal residence.

Re: Another cry for help!!
 

Hi,
this isn't correct! The future tenants' earnings are a big factor in choosing out of all the candidates (usually landlords ensure that the latters' monthly income is at least 3 times the rent, otherwise the candidates must give proof that a Guarantor will pay the rent).
Even then, we rented an appartment to an Avocate who, after ten years, just stopped paying the rent :eek: After a long procedure, we've managed to get her to leave, but she still owes us one year's rent and we're currently waiting for the Court's Decision. Proof that you can't have confidence in all high-earning professionals...:frown:

Re: Another cry for help!!
 

Hi,
One or two points on your posting. I wouldn't have thought French citizenship was now worth bothering with as the EU has made things so much more easy than they used to be. The only exception to that is when it comes to elections. Many of my friends feel left out when they find they're paying taxes but have no say in where their money goes, and by whom it is spent.
Secondly I'm not sure that it is wise to sell up everything in the UK, as this means burning your boats, given the disparity between UK house prices and those over here. You wouldn't be the first ex-pats to come over here and then find things aren't as hunky-dory as you'd been led to believe, but find yourselves stuck in what is after all a foreign country where people don't speak the same language and don't understand English even when it's shouted. As has been said already, language is the key to everything. It comes much easier when half one's family is French; whereas when both halves are British, and perhaps more inclined to stay among fellow ex-pats, the learning process can be painfully slow, especially the older one gets.
As regards capital gains tax on the sale of property that is not your résidence principale, it is on a sliding scale, according to how long you have owned the property. I wouldn't have thought taxes were ever "huge", unless the profit made is equally "huge".