House Hunting
A week of searching for the right address
House hunting is not for the weak. Especially for those unfamiliar with the ritual. After twenty-six years living in the same house, the issues are new. Add to that there are the quirks added by the change in country. France, the land of Liberté, Égalité, Fraternité, presents a few unique challenges.
In this case it’s the égalité clause that causes a bit of a speed bump. France is all about looking out for its citizens, especially the less than privileged. Fallen upon hard times; can’t pay the rent? Not to worry, the landlord-tenant relationship is designed to work for the tenant. Seems to work reasonably well. Don’t see many vagrants on the streets like back in Seattle or Vancouver, but…
We are in the market for a rental. A nice living area and kitchen, three or more bedrooms (June has to have a sewing room, or two). Parking would be nice – playing street parking roulette gets old quickly. Being retired septuagenarians, easy access to doctors is a requirement and having a boulangère across the street doesn’t hurt either.
Knowing this adventure was going to be challenging, we engaged what’s known to the Brits as a hand-holding service. We hired one to help secure our resident visas – as an Irish passport holder we have the right to live here, but we still need to be properly registered. They also help get us into the French health care system and provide tax advice. Right now, we are leaning on them to help in our rental search.
Finding a satisfactory rental should be easy – right? Find and advert for a place on the internet, contact the property agent, view it, like it, job done – right?
Not so fast crowed the tricolour rooster 🐓. Remember the égalité clause? The one that says tenants have rights? Here in France, they have great rights. Tenant rights are so good that landlords are very picky about who they will rent to. Your future landlord wants to know you are not a cheapskate. The landlord wants assurance that you will pay the rent. They want your past rental history in France going back three generations. They might even take your first born as collateral. You need to demonstrate you are worthy before they will talk to you.
So… our hand-holders. We made some lists. We gave them our requirements and told them to look at Bordeaux, Toulouse and the Montpellier areas. Bigger cities are friendlier to francophone challenged Anglos from the Pacific Northwest. We sent them a list of possibles discovered by searching SeLoger, and other similar sites. We sat and we wait.
Monday afternoon an email arrives. Can we be in Montpellier by ten tomorrow? There is an address that looks like it fits our needs.
We have been in France for six weeks now. We are starting to think about finding a good barber and perhaps a competent doctor. Of course we can be in Montpellier by ten tomorrow morning. Of course, we were late. I blame it on Waze and weird round-a-bouts. Of course the rental agent would have to re-schedule. It wasn’t a total loss – the local street art indicated that we should find a place with more talented artists. Or perhaps none.
We also learned that our communications plan was not communicated well. We needed some coaching on French telephone numbers. Sometimes you see them with a leading zero, sometimes you don’t. We find we have better success if we punch the zero into the French phone if you want to talk to someone. Isn’t that big an issue though because you usually end up listening to a recording, in French, which I assume is requesting that I should leave a message for the person whom I am trying to connect with.
Ok then. We are now in Montpellier playing email tag with our hand-holder. Really don’t want to drive three hours back to Lavaur to wait some more. The young lady who is assisting us realizes we have WhatsApp accounts. We start playing message tag. She also calls. Smart kid (anyone younger than thirty-five is a kid to me). She has lined up some more viewings. This afternoon in Montpellier, tomorrow, Wednesday in Nimes. Another on Thursday in Montpellier. Two in Nimes on Friday. I’m beginning to feel like a tennis ball on a forty-five-kilometer court 😊. Controlled confusion bordering on chaos. But hey, we signed up for an adventure – right?
Thursday night found us back in Nimes. The hotel desk clerk recognized us right away. Nice cheery sort.
Friday morning, learning from the previous days, we were half an hour early for our first visit. This place is a condo with three bedrooms, a large family room and kitchen. It looks south over a green space. Like living in a park – quiet – nice. Met the owner as well as the agent. Nice guy; knew I was Canadian so expected better French. When I explained we were from Vancouver, over three-thousand miles from Montreal, he laughed with us.
This condo will work. It checks the boxes. Even has a small elevator. We indicated as much to the agent and then asked our young lady friend to put in an application.
A few hours later found us in the center of Nimes looking at another apartment. This one, a three floor walk up, lived up to the brochure. It showed well with good space. Great terrace on the roof that is totally private. A bedroom with a bathroom is accessed from the terrace. Great setup for entertaining guests. Easy walk to the Arena and the Maison Carrée among other sites. Short distance to the train station. We were impressed. It lost points ‘cause there is no parking available, and three floors of stairs gets old pretty quick.
Ok – return to Lavaur and clean clothes. Now we wait. We wait to find out if Nimes will be our new address.
Greeting!
What a journey! Great idea to hire a handler otherwise you would really be at a disadvantage. I must say that the apartment with the roof top terrace would be our preferred accommodation! LOL. Thanks for keeping us up to date with your adventures! Good luck with the search!