petitefrancaise

Do you really think that is a suitable long term situation? A studio for a family of 4? Ok for a couple of weeks holiday ....

no privacy for adults, how about the children having a place to study in peace without being disturbed? Is it even legal to do this?

dmu

There are countless families squashed in smaller rooms because they can't afford to rent something bigger. I would think that it would be illegal and action could be taken against the landlords, only if such rented rooms were squalid and/or dangerous... On the other hand, Nimnom presumably owns the holiday-home and is answerable to no one (at least as far as numbers are concerned).
She doesn't say whether they are still living in the studio or whether they've since moved to a larger property.

TheClarkes

hiya AggieG. I hope you don't mind me jumping on your post. I'm in a similar position re having a business in the UK and moving to France- I was just wondering what advice you were given by the advisor please?

feel free to tell me to bog off!

Em

dmu

hi, and welcome to the forum!
AggieG hasn't been back since the above post, but post again in a New Thread, with a more pertinent title, e.g. "Transferring UK company to France". Those in the know might not necessarily be reading a thread on Annecy/family and not see your enquiry.....

EuroTrash

@TheClarkes, I'm not sure how valuable business advice is if it's not specific to you and your business, in fact unless your businesses are very similar and your personal circumstances are also very similar it could be badly misleading. An advisor will tailer their advice to each client.

nimnom

Yes, our living space is probably the same space as your wardrobe! Funnily enough it's only Americans who question people living in small spaces - I think it might be to do with the HUGE houses you guys have in America! Many people the world over live happily in small spaces. It works! We also have a cat and a hamster in our small apartment (owned before we moved here - not added - that would be a bit crazy!). Being in a small space has taught us to be more respectful, tolerant and considerate. We make quiet time when there is homework to be done and everyone gets on with it happily. If one child wants to be alone she makes a comfy spot in the corridor / kid's bedroom (they have flip-down bunks) or even in the bathroom and sits happily in there with the doors shut - often accompanied by the cat. In nice weather and when warm enough we use our balcony. We have lived like this for a year and a half and it's been wonderful. That's not to say I'm not keen to live in a house again - but I now have two bilingual children who are completely on a par, if not ahead, academically in their second language. They know the privilege of living in the mountains and understand the privilege of space too! A small space affords the freedom from too much ownership of stuff, too much housework and all sorts of other things. There are many upsides to a more minimal life. And it's 100% legal :-)

nimnom

Hi, I hope you got sorted.
Just to say about renting, in case you are still working it out, it is not so dreadfully hard to find a rental as some people make out. Yes, there are some really sticky agents there, but you find the reasonable ones too. We are moving and found a rental with an agent called 74Immo. We compromised a little on location and are renting in a less popular village, Ideally I would have been in or on the outskirts of a little town we like, but the properties there are super-popular and go very fast to families with all their ducks in a row. But we have found a lovely house not far away in a great, friendly village. Every time we viewed a house we found out what docs the agent would want and pulled together a dossier including a pic of our family, references from past landlords / agents that we translated into French & included the original, bank statements, letter from our UK accountant, found a nice French accountant who wrote a letter to say that he'd checked out our UK accountants and they were real (he really did check them out), that all the numbers on our statements meant we were solvent etc etc. I think I even put the kids' French school reports in there!!! Then, when we found the house we were ready to go. Interest was less in that house so we had a little time, though we might just have been lucky. This week went and did the school applications. It's pretty much a given that you'll get places in the local school so you don't need to sweat it. In holiday time if there's no admin at the schools you can do applications at the Mairie. Sometimes the school send you there anyway if you're after cut off.
Wishing you well,
Nimnom

dmu

Hi, it isn't the agent who's demanding, but the landlord. As often mentioned on the forum (and in the FAQs above), for a 3-year lease, landlords require proof that prospective tenants have a regular monthly income 3-4 times the rent. For newly arrived expats without a job lined up, this can be a problem without a Guarantor...
In our experience (Maternelle/Primaire in the Paris Region and the change of Primaire when we moved), you must apply to the Mairie with all the paperwork before you contact the Maternelle/Primaire officially. We came down to enrol them at the Mairie in June, before we moved, and met the Directeur before the school broke up. It did actually close for the whole of the holidays..... Can't comment on the Collège/Lycée fronts, as ours moved up automatically from Primaire to Collège and I don't know what the procedure is for newcomers.

petitefrancaise

ahh! good luck to you.
Personally, I'd rather be able to have, ahem, "adult time" without the kids in earshot!!

EuroTrash

Or indeed not even the landlord, but the landlord's insurance company because that's where the buck stops. Many landlords will only consider tenants that their landlord insurance (ie insurance against unpaid rent) will accept as a risk, and there is no flexibility there. If a tenant has a secure permanent income of at least three times the rent they are an acceptable risk, if they don't they're not. It doesn't matter what other documents you shower on the computer. Insurers are only interested in financial risk, they have their algorithm and they don't look at individuals case by case so they're not interested in family photographs, school reports or references from third parties.

The way round it is simply to rent from a landlord that doesn't use landlord insurance, which usually means a non-professional landlord. So first you have to find one, which pretty much excludes agencies because if a landlord doesn't use insurance he probably doesn't use an agency either, although nimnom has managed to find one that does. If you don't go through an agency you have to do your own due diligence and take your chances. Most are good responsible landlords but a few aren't, saying that of course not every professional is the perfect landlord either. That's how to do it, but for a Brit who's only just arrived or not even, it can be a lot of hassle. I see from nimnom's previous post that they've been living here in what used to be their holiday home since March 2017, so I imagine that being on the spot and having a stake in France, with a year's banking history with a French bank, all helped as well.

nimnom

Ha ha - you get used to it. Kids who sleep well... lunch breaks and creativity :-)

nimnom

[QUOTE=EuroTrash;12527749]Or indeed not even the landlord, but the landlord's insurance company because that's where the buck stops....

I think we got lucky. We work for a UK based company, for UK clients - so there were nerves around that. But with all the paperwork we presented we weren't asked for extra deposit, money in an inaccessible account or anything, though some agents said we would have to do those things. In fact it was better renting here than when we returned to the UK from a decade in NZ. But as I say, I think we got lucky!

EuroTrash

[QUOTE=nimnom;12527970] If you have an employer and therefore presumably an employment contract, shouldn't be a problem either way. A job contract is what they want to see

dmu

[QUOTE=nimnom;12527970] Recently there have been a few threads on residing in France but working for a UK company.
As a matter of interest for potential expats in this situation, does your UK company pay the same crippling cotisations to URSSAF as French employers do, for your respective healthcare coverage?
Not being nosey, but the above thread starters didn't come back with feedback as to their UK employers' enthusiasm, and there's no knowing how things turned out for them.

EuroTrash

Cotisations are calculated on exactly the same basis regardless of whether the employer has an establishment in France or not, and therefore the employee receives exactly the same social cover and entitlements.The only difference is that employers without an establishment in France obviously wouldn't qualify from any tax breaks or incentives that France happens to be offering to encourage companies to take on stagiaires or extra employees.

I know some employees in that situation manage to come to an agreement where they take a salary cut so as to share the burden, of course to do that they need to be on a salary well above SMIC to start with. But I suspect most UK employers say sod that for a game of soldiers when they realise what's involved, and either the employee carries on working "on the black" as far as France is concerned, which is a risk because it's not hard to pick up on and also it leaves them with no legitimate route to healthcare, or they set up a false micro entreprise. Fudging it with a micro used to be the low risk option plus you got healthcare, but for anyone aiming to stay after Brexit, it's going to be hard to make their business accounts and their bank statements look convincing if they have no client invoices to show and regular payments from just one source going into their bank. If it looks like a salary and smells like a salary, how do you persuade the préfecture that they're not looking at salariat déguisé, and there's your "status" gone out of the window..