Originally Posted by Pistolpete2

It all depends what your personal wants and needs AND FINANCES are which could be entirely different from somebody else's and tax can be an issue in France too. English language, schools, isolation, pubs, shops, bureaucracy allergy, family..............

For instance, you mentioned that you have a significant holding of land. Funnily enough when I was in France a couple of years back I spoke to a retired Brit who lives in Morbihan in Brittany who said that in retrospect the biggest regret he had was that he had TOO MUCH LAND to the point where he is a slave to it. I agreed with him wholeheartedly and would run a mile now to have less land than the acre-plus I have to maintain, let alone the property/house itself if only because unlike many others, I am not green-fingered or handy, though am a reluctant bride to it all these days out of necessity.

Originally Posted by Harvester523

That's exactly it. We have horses and goats. In the UK it would be impossible to own enough land. Too many people come here and think ooo, land! and not the amount of work that goes in to it. The UK doesn't allow people who'd like land to have it, unless they're very wealthy. Even in remote Wales, this sort of holding would be 3k£!

Originally Posted by Pistolpete2

It all depends what your personal wants and needs AND FINANCES are which could be entirely different from somebody else's and tax can be an issue in France too. English language, schools, isolation, pubs, shops, bureaucracy allergy, family..............

For instance, you mentioned that you have a significant holding of land. Funnily enough when I was in France a couple of years back I spoke to a retired Brit who lives in Morbihan in Brittany who said that in retrospect the biggest regret he had was that he had TOO MUCH LAND to the point where he is a slave to it. I agreed with him wholeheartedly and would run a mile now to have less land than the acre-plus I have to maintain, let alone the property/house itself if only because unlike many others, I am not green-fingered or handy, though am a reluctant bride to it all these days out of necessity.

Originally Posted by Harvester523

That's exactly it. We have horses and goats. In the UK it would be impossible to own enough land. Too many people come here and think ooo, land! and not the amount of work that goes in to it. The UK doesn't allow people who'd like land to have it, unless they're very wealthy. Even in remote Wales, this sort of holding would be 3k£!

Originally Posted by Harvester523

Why not?

Originally Posted by chris955

The reason your arguments cant be taken seriously is you generalise and falsely generalise. It's absolutely ridiculous to say it is impossible to own enough land in the UK to keep horses and goats, what about all the people that do just that ? You most certainly do not need to be very wealthy to do it. Our friends in Wales have a lovely big property, they have sheep, horses, pigs etc and most certainly are not wealthy. We could easily keep goats on our property and we are not wealthy.

Originally Posted by Harvester523

Obviously wealthy means different levels to different people. I would suggest you are comparitively wealthy.
It's impossible for me to own land in the UK.
One can't generalise more than you do Chris.

Originally Posted by dunroving

Terms like wealth (and poverty, to an extent) are so subjective and have so many definitions that I think it's difficult for many people to say they are definitely one or the other, or definitely not one or the other.

On various measures of "wealth", I'd guess I am anywhere between about the 25th percentile and the 95th percentile, compared to the rest of the population.

Originally Posted by chris955

I'm not comparatively wealthy at all. It clearly isnt impossible for people to own land in the UK otherwise nobody would own land in the UK. Many of the houses in our village have at least an acre of land and I doubt many here would consider themselves wealthy.
I understand you love France and good for you and you clearly had a hard life here but your experiences dont automatically become those of everyone.
Sorry but you have certainly beaten me

Originally Posted by Pistolpete2

Having a house which is paid for doesn't count for much if you are asset rich and cash poor.

Try this survey for a measurement of affluence in terms of income:

http://www.ifs.org.uk/wheredoyoufitin/

Most Brits clearly don't have a pot to p _ _ s in.

Originally Posted by Pistolpete2

Having a house which is paid for doesn't count for much if you are asset rich and cash poor.

Try this survey for a measurement of affluence in terms of income:

http://www.ifs.org.uk/wheredoyoufitin/

Most Brits clearly don't have a pot to p _ _ s in.

While I'm still busy pushing funds into my UK State Pension, I take pleasure in knowing I'm increasing my wealth there, to the level of the present value of future pension rights. As nun mentioned somewhere, annuities pay precious little these days, making a UK State Pension one of the most valuable assets one could have, along with other indexed government pension streams. If you croak you do of course get nothing, unless it is guaranteed or survivor.

Originally Posted by dunroving

Even considering that it is primarily an income-based tool, it is rather simplistic.

It seems rather strange that it asks you how much your council tax is, but not what your mortgage or rental payments are - that is a major cash outlay for some, and zero for others.

Originally Posted by dunroving

Current best buy annuities are about £6,000 p.a. for a £100k pot (single life annuity, fixed income), or about £3,500 p.a. (inflation-linked annual rises). The latter is the closest analogy to UK pension (which also has annual inflation-linked increases) - so, 3.5% yield, pretty pathetic.

However, I sense there is change in the air - lots of rumblings about insurance companies being held accountable for the crap annuity rates - hopefully the options will be batter in 5 or 10 years.

Originally Posted by Moses2013

Absolutely right. I don't know why Harvester523 thinks it's impossible to keep goats? It's really cheap in Northern Ireland which is also UK. Taxes are also very high in France and not everyone in France has loads of land Harvester523.