Tweedpipe

Good post from Garonne, which truly highlights some of the difficulties.
Bear in mind also that electricity, gas or oil (for heating) seems to increase annually at a frightening rate. Although I can't recall the exact amount, there are increases in electricity charges planned for 1st Jan 2013 and/or 1st July.
Note that earlier this year, EDF proposed to the government an electricity price increase of 5.1 - 6.5% per year over the next 5 years. Compared to the increase in previous years, an average of +6% per year would unfortunately not appear to be unrealistic.
For gas, +2.4% has been announced for Jan 1st 2013, with 2 further increases highly likely before end 2013.
As a guide for domestic fuel and propane (heating/cooking), these increased by 7% and 11% respectively in 2010, and by 8% and 12% in 2011.
And none of us are naive enough to believe that the price of petrol will not be increased during 2013. Same goes for tobacco - if you are a smoker, the price increase rocketed in 2012 by almost 6%.
I've not begun to mention what increases may be expected with home, car, and health insurance, rents/associated charges, or food products.
2012 has been a tough year for so many. 2013 and onwards I predict will be far worse - unless one is relatively comfortable financially.
Button down the hatches!

Tweedpipe

Good suggestion.

Novocastrian

I've just read the posting history. Train crash. Word.

EuroTrash

You can do a tax simulation here, but I'm not sure whether this will calculate income tax only, or income tax plus social charges.
http://www3.finances.gouv.fr/calcul_impot/2012/simplifie/index.htm

I hate to add to the negativity but I fear it won't be long before you start getting stressed about money.

I'm still not sure you have budgeted for your healthcare. State healthcare plus top-up is only an option for as long as you are either covered by an S1 or eligible for CMU, and it seems to me that there is going to be a gap when you will have no state healthcare entitlement. If your husband has 7 years before he gets his state retirement pension, and you get an S1 for 2 years, that means either you will need to take out full health cover for 3 years and then try to get onto CMU on the basis of 5 years legal residence, or you keep under the parapet for the 5 years between your intial S1 running out and getting the retirement S1. Private healthcare will cost you several thousands a year for 3 years, having no healthcare at all is risky (and illegal). Or have I missed something, do you have a transferable benefit?

My lowest annual income ever was my second year in France when I was trying to find clients here, I earned around 6 000€ which after cotisations was around 4 500€ in the bank. That was for one person. I lived as cheaply as I could, I was exempted from taxe d'hab, I didn't take out a top-up that year, and it wasn't quite enough to live on. I had to dip into savings. And I wouldn't want to live like that year after year after year.

So yes, two people living cheaply might be able to manage on 8 000 a year if they don't have full private health insurance to pay, and if no major expense comes up. But in 7 years there are bound to be things that need repairing and replacing, especially if you try to economise on maintenance such as car and boiler servicing. And even when the pension starts coming in, will you be all that much better off? Will there be light at the end of the tunnel? It seems to me that you're letting yourselves in for a long hard struggle.

Have you thought about trying to get a part-time job? I know it's not easy to find work but if you could, you would have a bit of money coming in, it would solve the healthcare problem at a stroke, and also it would help you get to know people and tap into local knowledge and support which can in itself save you loads of money.

Garonne

I'm very surprised you haven't replied to any of these latest posts and yet you have posted on Le RDV about getting all the Sky channels when (not if) you move to France and continuing to pay your subscription. I'm totally astonished that having been given the advice and warnings about your money 'stretching' over 6 years and none of us thinking it's possible, one of your major priorities is sorting out getting Sky AND paying for it. You can get the basic channels for free.

As someone else has said, when your S1 runs out you'll have to get full health insurance which will cost you a packet out of your 8k a year.

As sure as eggs is eggs you'll be posting on here asking for advice about this, that and the other when you move here, but personally if I'm still kicking about in 2 years' time I reckon I'll be reading a post from you to say you couldn't afford full insurance and now have a bill to pay of xxxxxx thousand euros ... what can I do? Our answers will be to re-read this thread. I don't think you've done anywhere near enough research and was trying to be gentle with my earlier posts but having read that a pay-for Sky contract is top of the priority list I can't stop myself from being more brutally honest.

In France, any bills owed to the Trésorerie are taken automatically from your bank account. This includes hospital bills, taxes, etc. If there are insufficient funds in your bank account they send the bailiffs. Having spent quite some time on my last post to you, trying to give you a real-life comparable example of what it will cost you to live here you clearly are not really interested in facts and figures.

We are NOT being kill-joys but I wouldn't want my worst enemy to be in my shoes at the moment. I had an extremely good job and was made redundant a couple of years ago and can't find any other work apart from the odd bit of translating here and there (mainly for people who move here and get into difficulty one way or another with the various official organisations).

Instead of wanting to be sure you can transfer your Sky inscription here, I'd spend the time more usefully doing some more number crunching. You will also have to re-register your vehicle(s) which depending on age may require new headlamps but will definitely require certificate of conformity and a couple of hundred euros depending on its 'puissance' to register. Then you'll have the cost of having your documents (birth, marriage certificates) all officially translated and loads of other 'hidden extras' .....

Good luck - you'll need it.

dmu

Last October the OP did ask about renting short-term in France after deciding against a move to Spain.
Within two months, and contrary to what she declared about not committing themselves, they are burning their boats in the UK and buying a house in France, to live, apparently without considering all the financial side of surviving here.

dmu

I agree. Apart from being half the minimum wage,
http://www.insee.fr/fr/themes/tablea...id=NATnon04410
indicates that it's half the official "poverty threshold" for a couple without children.

Rups14

Hi all,

I too am at the naive stage of considering/budgeting a move to France. It's early days but my first step is budgeting the cost of buying running and maintaining a house.

As such I've been in touch with a couple who are selling a house on Rightmove within my budget , no agent. House is in Tarn, near Castres, on bank of River Agout. Two existing beds, 2 baths and possibility of converting utility room into 3rd bed. Barn across the road for parking.

I asked about the running costs and got the following replay which i would like to run by you to see if these numbers are feasible. nb They don't mention Tax D'Habitation - maybe they're exempt and forgot to mention this tax?

"""the house tax is called 'tax fonciere' and in a small village it is very low. We pay around €330 a year, and it is paid by whoever owns the house on 1st January.
The property and land is freehold. The water charges are around €250 to €300 a year.
There is no mainline gas in the village - so we use bottled gas to cook with- and our usage is around 4 bottles a year @ 15€ = 60€
Our electricity bill is around 100€ a month.
The boiler runs on fuel and that costs us around 750 to 800€ a year."""

Thanks for a very informative thread, hope i didn't derail it with this post.

EuroTrash

Is this an ex-pat couple by any chance?

"the house tax is called 'tax fonciere' and in a small village it is very low. We pay around €330 a year, and it is paid by whoever owns the house on 1st January."

This is a property tax rather than a house tax (i.e. you also pay it on unbuilt land, and buildings that aren't houses e.g. the barn). They are correct that the bill is sent out in Oct/Nov to whoever owned the house on 1 Jan, but it is customary, when a house changes hands part way through the year, for each owner to pay proportionally. However, if they aren't going to ask you for anything, you're onto a winner.

As you say, there is also taxe d'habitation, and if you add a third bedroom this tax might increase from its present level (not sure on this, I suspect a bedroom would incur more tax than a utility room but stand to be corrected).

"The water charges are around €250 to €300 a year."
Water is normally metered, so it will depend how much you use. I'm a one-person household, I work away frequently, and from memory I pay between 10-15€ a month, so could be about right. But, does it include sewage? Is the house on mains drainage or does it have a fosse? You need to find that out, and if it's a fosse you need to be sure it conforms.

"There is no mainline gas in the village - so we use bottled gas to cook with- and our usage is around 4 bottles a year @ 15€ = 60€"
Feasible, though not generous.

"Our electricity bill is around 100€ a month."
That's a lot. All electric heating?

"The boiler runs on fuel and that costs us around 750 to 800€ a year." Fuel=heating oil, presumably? And presumably just for hot water?

First question is, how is the house heated and could it be heated more economically by, say, a woodburner?

Another point to bear in mind is that 'valeurs locatifs' on which the two property taxes are based are currently being reassessed all over France. At 330€ it sounds as if this village hasn't been reassessed yet. Forums are full of people complaining that their taxes have gone up 10%, 20%, even 50% since last year - so leave space in your budget in case the taxes do go up dramatically in the next few years.

If you want phone/internet, that is likely to be 35-40€ a month. House insurance. Ongoing maintenance. Can't think of anything else as regards the house.

Check about the fosse and get a figure for the taxe d'hab.

Hope this helps, but it is just my opinion so don't treat as gospel

White Trash

Take what some of the posters say above about minimum income needed with a grain of salt. I have read on another forums about people who insist on needing €20,000 a year to live a barely adequate existence. It all depends on what standard you are expecting (or feel you must have). Your property taxation is wholly dependent on where you settle and what amenities you have in your house, overall size, number of rooms, bathrooms, etc. Do you really need to run a 4x4, pool, keep horses and go back to UK for shopping and grandkids every few months? I have been living a pretty basic but happy life here for 12 years now and here is an example of how life is at the bottom end of the scale. End of year totals for 2012: EDF €520, Tax habitation 0, Tax Fonciere €141, Phone €192, House insurance €165, Top up insurance €592, Water €140, Vehicle insurance €385. I don't have any form of heating apart from what I burn in a woodburner so that is a variable expense depending on the source. Food is the other variable. I buy what and when I can afford it. This all comes out of the basic UK state pension of £439 a month. Do you want to live like this? I am happy to because if I went back to UK I wouldn't have enough cash to live anywhere better than a bedsit in a building full of crackheads. If the OP wants to try to make a go of it here I for one wouldn't want to put him off.

Rups14

I've not yet viewed the house or met the vendors (they are away in Spain until March). I assume at least the wife is English due to her style of writing. I suspect the husband may be French. They have a Chinese-sounding surname.

All correspondence has been via photographs and emails online. The house looks beautiful but I am essentially using it as a benchmark to help my calculations etc. I may very well end up buying this house but have a lot to learn before committing myself.

I so appreciate your response and will get to work finding out about the sewage and heating.

wetwang

One assumes that if you are getting emails then Internet is available. However its worth checking as even in the Dordogne there are villages where there is no connection.
Life without wifi is unimaginable today.

Rups14

Good point, as mentioned above, they are currently in Spain.

More things to check. I am starting to feel overwhelmed at the prospect of moving to France, which is a good thing, stop any rash decisions.

Thanks.

cyrian

Exactly! We toured most regions in France over the years and when we started to close in on a location, we visited it several times looking at different aspects each visit.
We were sure of our choice when we eventually made it and have had no regrets since.
We considered - too hot in summer or too cold in winter; coastal or inland; good and reliable transport links back home; too many Brits or too few Brits; rural or town.
Consider renting somewhere for 6 months and view everything as a resident - not as a tourist.
Castres is really nice - I spent several days near there - but it is quite far to the nearest airport. I wasn't aware of train links.
Happy planning.

Im_and_Er

Obviously everybody's wants and needs are different plus there are regional variations to take into account however for a basic reasonably comfortable lifestyle - including a mutuelle - we budget €1200/mth and pretty well manage to stick to it.

Because neither of us are quite of UK pensionable age yet we are living on the proceeds of a couple of private pensions which currently do not add up to €1200 and therefore for a couple of years are having to nibble away at savings so it's in our interest to stick to the budget as far as is possible.

What has not been mentioned is that if you need private health insurance you may find it impossible to secure if you have any existing medical complaints. Remember to automatically qualify for French health care after 5 years residence you must have had full and comprehensive health insurance for that period so skimping on that could possibly have significant consequences further down the road.