Touraine

If you look in the right areas it is doable on your budget (90,000 k = 123,000 euros)

You could pick this up for 100,000 euros.

Maison 4P + D�pendances 300 m� + Terrain Ventes immobili�res Sa�ne-et-Loire - leboncoin.fr

Needs some decor work but it has 7000 sq metres of land. Lots of horses in that village.

Stay CLEAR of expat estate agent websites and mainstream expat areas.

dmu

Many of us have been living the harsh realities for decades! Which is why potential expats must be made aware of all the cons before considering the pros.
And one big con would be your partner's private healthcare insurance, unless ET can confirm that she would be covered by your own S1 based on your UK Pension.
The second con is the 60% Succession Tax, which we aren't exaggerating. My neighbour inherited her childless concubine's house and she had to sell it rapidly in order to be able to pay the 60% within the deadline. Luckily they were living in her own house, so she wasn't made homeless.... As I said, this 60% Tax will have to be paid if you aren't married or pacséd and you name each other as heirs. French Law will govern regarding the Succession Tax due on French property. Married couples, children, and other relatives have less Tax to pay on their share.... It's a good reason for getting hitched!
The third con is your style of living on your one Pension. As it stands, you won't have enough to pay a Mutuelle each, let alone keep a horse. Mutuelles aren't compulsory, but highly recommended as one gets older. And 30% of consultation fees, pharmaceuticals, blood tests, physiotherapy, etc... take a big chunk out of a budget if you haven't got a Mutuelle to reimburse them.
Not to mention the horses - it's all very well believing that you could do without for a month in order to get a new shoe for a horse, but the view might not compensate for an empty stomach, or the electricity being cut off. A propos farriers, it might be a good idea to look in the Pages Jaunes for the area in which you're interested, to make sure that there are "maréchaux-ferrants" there.
Hope all this is giving you food for thought!

EuroTrash

OP will be inactif and will not get an S1 until he reaches UK state retirement age.
Healthcare options if he moved now would be, either join CMU if accepted and pay cotisations plus potentially 15 per cent (is it? someone will confirm) social charges on his pension income, plus mutuelle if he wants, or take out full private health insurance and no social charges or mutuelle to pay. He'll have to work out which would work out better. But if they ride a lot and don't have much money in the bank, they need to be sure they have their healthcare covered one way or the other.

All this is going to hinge on very much on what the exchange rate does between now and when the OP is ready to move. If it goes back to the levels of the early 2000s it should be a goer. If it goes back to parity, hmm.

To my mind there's just too many factors involved over which the OP will have no control - living in an EUR state with a 100 per cent sterling income, not much of a cushion for increases in property taxes or new taxes, uncertainty over how much he has to set aside for healthcare. I don't mind taking a flyer when it's up to me to make it come good, but these are all things that no individual can do anything about. And there's always the 'what if the UK exits the EU' scenario, very unlikely but possible I suppose.

Steviecops

But you changed what is said?

EuroTrash

NC didn't change what it said - just added a comment in red, asking for clarification.

You said £80. Obviously you didn't mean £80 because nobody can buy a house for £80. So NC added a question to your post to clarifiy, can we assume that you mean 80K ? Or should we add a few more zeros ?

"I will have a budget of around £70 - £80 K, I assume to buy a property, (please don't all scoff at once!), and realise that for this money some modernisation will be needed."

I'm sure it was very clear to you what you meant, but one does see posters on forums who have half a million to spend and are genuinely enquiring whether you can buy somewhere nice in France for that.

dmu

The OP will have his UK Pension when they come over, he won't be inactif. I was wondering whether his partner would benefit from his entitlement to French Healthcare coverage and, if so, what steps would he have to take before leaving the UK, to ensure this?

grannybunz

But he wouldn't have his state pension until he or she reach retirement age so the only way they could access health care (other than by paying the dread social charges from the private pension) would be through private insurance - not cheap. They would be covered (partly) by the EHIC system for a certain amount of time - not sure for how long these days.

InVinoVeritas

Inactif means not employed or not unemployed so the OP will be inactif.

On the basis of what he has told us I don't think it is doable on his budget - and we haven't even got into frais de notaire when buying and frais de vente if he doesn't like it here and decides to sell up (if he can even find a buyer).

Steviecops

Thanks so much for all the info and advice. It certainly has given me plenty to think about and to research in more depth. That's great, just what I was after. This is very early days for me and I realise that my plans might not be practical or even possible, but we have to start somewhere if we want to move forwards and make changes. Two and again years is a long time and a lot can change in that time. Realistically, if it's still a possibility when I retire, I'd rent first before taking the plunge, anyway. In the meantime, I'm still going to learn the language, just in case, and soak up information like a sponge.

Steviecops

Ah, thank you for pointing out my mistake and making things clear. I hadn't realised, sorry. Yes, I meant £70 - £80 k. I've been looking at houses that require modernisation, not restoration, with enough land and one or two outbuildings for round that figure or just under. My budget won't exhaust the lump sum I'll get when I retire. It's going to boil down to whether I can survive on my monthly pension with all the taxes, etc, taken into account.

dmu

My bad, I've just realised I'm confusing a State Pension with a Government Pension which the OP will receive as a former Fireman? So he would indeed be inactif for a few years, which complicates matters on the finance front for them both.
@stevie, glad to hear that you're taking all our info on board and not ignoring us, like some posters in the past have done! The nitty-gritty of living in France, with all its quirks, is nothing like spending holidays here.
Persevere with your French, that's another factor to take into account!

babyposer

I think your budget for a 3 bedroom house is unrealistic for Bordeaux/Bergerac.

However you can have a look at this website which tells you how much you pay per square metre, on average:

Prix immobilier : le prix du m2 pour toutes les villes de France

As you can see Bordeaux is 3 028 € / m² and the département Gironde is 2263 € / m².

£80k is approximately 110 000 euros, so:

110000/3028 = 36 m²
110000/2263 = 48 m²

A one bedroom flat is approximately 50 m²...

If you zoom in you can check all the towns, so that's pretty useful. There are some villages in the Charente département which are 900 euros per square metre for instance.

Touraine

What is wrong with my house I found...

Maison 4P + D�pendances 300 m� + Terrain Ventes immobili�res Sa�ne-et-Loire - leboncoin.fr

I would buy that.

Steviecops

Nothing wrong with it at all! It's beautiful and I'd love to live in it!
And what about this?

http://www.green-acres.com/en/properties/31882a-9564.htm

Or this?

http://www.green-acres.com/en/properties/31882a-10310.htm

Looking at these properties makes my heart race when I think of the possibilities.

Touraine

They are OK....but the region ?????

Stay away from green acres at the moment and use the 'le bon coin' for searching for houses.

You need to find horsey regions. The region/area/village I gave you is a good bet.

The most important thing is that you find a house that you can easily sell back at the same price that you bought it. That is hard with cheap property.