dmu

Hi, and welcome to the Forum!
I live in the Hérault and would suggest that you focus on the south of Montpellier near the sea. Anywhere else immediately "around" Montpellier is flat and uninteresting and has nothing for tourists. Going further inland, you'll find natural and architectural beauties that attract potential clients.
As for regulations, a google search gave the following unofficial site among others:
http://www.partenaire-europeen.fr/Ac...alite-20100812
but those in the know will advise from experience...

wetwang

We did zero research and bought the only place we viewed. We didn't even know that Sarlat was particularly a tourist town. I guess we bought it as it looked the kind of property in the kind of town where we would like to stay
The only legislation that I knew of was that 5 bedrooms were the max, above which you fell into a commercial tax regime, similar to Uk rules.
We started with 2 lettable rooms but quickly discovered that would never pay the mortgage; now we have 4. The Chamber of Commerce suggested that I did not register with them as their paperwork was far too onerous for a small business. There's honesty

We were also far too cheap as guests admitted they were concerned when we offered rooms at 60 euros that it sounded too cheap. The same rooms are now €95 a night and we are just as full.
Tax is a breeze,you just declare your income and the friendly staff down the impot work it out for you. There is a bit of tourist tax to collect too. There maybe some changes to how it's calculated this year but they will sort it out.

When I read of business models and budgets I shudder. That's grown-up speak and over complicates a mom and pop business. I just know that if I achieve 50% occupancy before May 1st then it all works well. We have not failed since 2005 to achieve that figure.
I have been a bit ill with a touch of cancer and thought I would move on this year but killing the goose that lays the golden egg is difficult and with the increased room rates we can afford cleaners so the main thrust of the job is emails and socializing .
Nice work if you can get it.

DKP

Thank you both for your replies.

I am so sorry to hear that you have been very ill Wetwang.

It sounds as if you made a very wise choice initially. I have a business background and it was always drummed into me that I had to do business models and cash flow forecasts.

If I want to buy a property , which will give me 4/5 letting rooms, I will need to borrow a little more, and assume that I must demonstrate where the additional income will be derived? Hence the cash flow/business plan.

Are your guests entirely tourists, or are you in an area where you have business clients as well?

cjm

Just some observations DKP as with your background you will be covering most of the angles. The 'wet finger in the air' factor, in these times, is the tough one, as I view tourists, including French tourists. We live in a French second home area, not just our village but on the coast. Of nine properties around us, seven are French second homes. Our French friends come for the full summer, one is already here, perhaps just for Easter.
The toughie for you, as I see it, is determining the level of business from tourism, French, UK and elsewhere (Dutch and Belgian mostly).
I am assuming you have or are doing local research via your local Tourisme; that is vital, but like most 'council' employees they are not encouraged to say anything negative. Can you post some more thoughts ...

wetwang

Our guests are 95% English speaking. 50% australians 40% N American including Canadians. The rest are Spanish/new Zealand/ Dutch//Brits and rarely French.
We have no business visitors.
When I got a mortgage in France it was based on my income at that time when I had a proper job. They were not concerned with future income, simply, could I demonstrate that I could afford repayments based on my circumstances at that time. All pretty easy really but that was 2004 and I do not know if things have changed.

DKP

Thank you for your reply.

I spent most of last year travelling in France to the areas that I felt might be of interest from a business perspective.

I decided that I wanted to be in an area that was not wholly reliant on tourism. ie Montpelier, Marseille, Perpignan, Nice.

I decided that Perpignan was too small, Nice too costly which left Marseille and Montpellier.

After further analysis, I decided that Montpelier would probably give me the most options at the best price.

Mixture of Tourists/Business expansion/Academia

DKP

Thank you Wetwang.

That is really helpful info re the break down of nationalities.

Whilst my income/deposit covers a normal family home, to go that little bit larger I need to demonstrate that guest income can contribute towards the pot.

Are all your letting rooms doubles with en suite?

cjm

What wetwang has posted is incredible. Aussies? Yanks? We are surely talking about a website, or range of sites. Expand?

wetwang

All our rooms are en suite. The international market demands it.
Naturally we have a website. No website= No business.
I use google Adwords to select countries of choice.,but tripadvisor is essential.
For me the best thing about our location is that our average stay is 3 nights which makes life so much easier. We do not accept advance bookings of 1 night but might accept a walk-in if we can be bothered and need to fill a gap.

loy loy

We stayed in Noble Val once, beautiful, but there are several B&B's in the village, and not that much around there. Did have a good night with the locals on pastis though.

We looked at moving to this region as we love Albi which is beautiful and visited the area around there many many times. We even looked at a B and B.

Decided the sums didn't add up and found we preferred this region.

wetwang

Thinking about this topic I thought I would check out how much I have spent on advertising since 2005. Clicking into my google account I asked it for my 'all time' expenditure.
I was quite surprised at the answer.If any one wants to guess or is interested I will reveal the figure later.

Le Chant

Hi Novo! I was alerted to this thread while checking my website stats. Thanks very much for the kind comments. We're still here, business is booming. Shame about the weather though!

Novocastrian

Hi there! I'm very glad to hear that things are going well.

Please say hello to S. from C. and myself. We'll have to drop by your place unexpectedly one day.

How's the oven?

DKP

Always difficult to guess an advertising budget!

If you get it "right" first time it can be suprisingly little.
Often the early days can be trial and error.

Since 2005 ------- 2100 euros??????

Interested to know where you advertise, and wondering if you are Australian or American as that is where the bulk of your business is derived?

Really good info on this thread - thank you.

wetwang

I did say I was surprised. The actual figure is €39727.
However those sorts of figures are meaningless unless you compare them to something.
Compared to bed nights booked it has cost €8.22 per bed night. Not really a big deal but you can see that only having a couple of rooms to let is not viable and only worth doing if you have alternative income.

Had I have used Bookings .com it would have cost up to three times more.
A pal of mine uses them all the time and pays 20% per booking commission.
English and French are often the most miserable of guests and often want to horse trade on the price. East coast Americans are similar. I cant stand it. I would rather have an empty room than dicker over a €10 discount. I can't get 10% off my rates or grocery bill or plumber so I don't know why people try it on when we offer the going market rate for the area and location. I have offered discounts if people are prepared to bring their own towels and sheets but of course that's a non-starter.

The best guests are Ausies or West Coast Americans/Canadians. As soon as they hit the door they ask for a beer and I know we are in for some fun. Brits will ask for a cup of tea on arrival and that's about the most inter-reaction I am going to get.

I am from Yorkshire so advertising world wide was a stab in the dark, except I knew that Paris was full pf them, and of course the dollar has in the past been good value against the Euro .
As I said before its just Google and Tripadvisor. Cheap portals are no good and you cannot count on Tourist Info Offices. You must realize that for B&B the best tourist business is in May and September. It's too hot in summer for the silver foxes and families are not the B&B market anyway.

Good luck, but see it as a business in leisure tourism and not some Mom and Pop homely spare time pin money operation.

The tourist trail is Normandy beaches to St Malo, the Loire Valley especially Amboise, Dordogne, Carcasonne, Biarritz to San Sebastián, Nimes, Avignon, Provence Coast, French Alps. Any where else most tourists have never heard of because they have no international status or profile.

That will be 10 guineas. Thank you.