News from the Aude

Last Thursday we had one of our properties featured in the Irish times. It's called take 5 where the Times compares 5 houses from around the world at a very similar price.

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Please have a look at the changes we have made to the website. You can now search more easily as you have more criteria boxes so you can search on number of rooms and garden size !Happy hunting

Topsy, turvey times indeed! According to the media we're in a recession it's more or less official, well the U.K. is anyway. Here in France we haven't really been affected or at least not that you'd notice in fact we are getting people with lots of money. I suppose in uncertain times people who have their house for sale could be very tempted to accept offers that they wouldn't normally entertain, I suppose everything has a knock-on effect, what goes up, must come down etc.etc. We're actually all lined up for half term weekend and we're going to be busy and this week has already seen a good few clients. Having been following the news and the turbulent times followed by the weather report I can't think of many good reasons to stay in the U.K.

Although the summer was a little bit slow and it usually is! Some vendors have really taken the initiative to kick start the market by really pricing their properties realistically or reducing the price of the properry to make it very attractive. My top 3 this week can be viewed by clicking the link or on our website www.simplylanguedocproperties.com.

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With a certain amount of uncertainty regarding the property market in the UK some may find borrowing from banks a bit difficult at the moment. Not so in France due to the infra structure and more stringent rules on lending we don't seem to have been affected by the credit crunch. The property market is holding firm and one of our lending banks has just made borrowing even easier! Today I received the following mail. Please enjoy the promotional offers for any complete application file sent to Head Office before the end of the year. 1/ EQUITY RELEASE PROJECTS : Loan to Value goes up from 70% to 80%. 2/ INTEREST ONLY : Minimum amount of mortgage = 70,000€ instead of 100,000€ (subject to net assets) 3/ Possibility to be financed 100% for CAPITAL REPAYMENT MORTGAGE and 90% for INTEREST ONLY MORTGAGE of the net purchase price excluding estate agent fees - unless already included in the price - and notaire fees) for clients belonging to List A (see attached document) Maximum mortgage amount : 300,000€ - Subject to conditions (income to outgoings and leftover) So where's the catch, well you have to apply before the end of the year, it's as simple as that, so if you need finance for your French property purchase and have been turned down else where please contact us to see if we can help you.

They do say everyone gets it! My 15 minutes might be in differnent stages though! Last Thursday I was filmed on Belgium television for a program called.........wait for it.........Homes under the sun. Apparently a very popular program in Belgium(did you know they only have 4 TV channels!) unfortunately I don't get Belgium TV so I'll have to watch it on DVD. But that's not all! I have been contacted by an American company to be filmed for a program called International Home Hunter and they want to film me and a couple as they try and find a house to buy in Languedoc and relocate from the U.K. I agreed and so did my clients and hopefully filming will be shot in late September(I'm just waiting from my agent in LA to confirm!) joking aside the program is also screened in Canada, New Zealand, Australia, Ireland and the UK and an audience of 91,000,000.00 viewers............shouldn't be too nerve wracking.

Now I agree that talking to clients and my management company people that there was a bit of worry for summer rentals even as late as May this year, but thanks to the good old British summer coming up trumps again a late rush of bookings from people trying to get some summer sun; all rentals ended up being nearly 100% booked and some are even taking bookings for next year. Languedoc has really picked up on tourism in the 7 years that I have lived here and there's so many more things for tourists to do and see and a regular new batch of tourist attractions seem to open on an annual basis and now every village seems to be holding fetes and vide greniers and not just in the summer months. Music festivals and folklore displays are becoming a very regular occurrence and the host of international and local artists and sculptors are mind boggling. Having spent a bit of time talking to tourists it's appears there's a lot more to the Aude region than fabulous food, great wines, great weather and a stunning landscape in easy reach of most of Europe.............there's something for everyone when you get there!

There are a lot of mixed signals out there and different people have different angles on the French property market at the moment. The brits are still buying but not in the numbers that they used to but then again July and August are generally quiet months for the Brits to buy, on the other hand there is still and increasingly more so lots more interest from the Dutch, Germans, Belgians, Swiss and Scandanavian countries but more than ever it's the French. France hasn't really been affected by the credit crunch due to the fiscal regulations that exist, we did see some small protests when the fuel prices were increased but even that's come down again now to a more reasonable level. Strangely we've seen lots of clients with budgets of 1 million plus euros and are just starting to see the spread of Russians starting to come across from the cote d'Azur and they're really holding up and maybe inflating the prices at the top end of the market, saying that there are lots of properties on the market and we are seeing stronger negociating from buyers but within reason. With Languedoc becoming the 4th biggest in France for industry the prices should still see some rise and figures have been quoted at approx. 7% by a respected body of estate agents which is up on last years figures, personally I think this might be a little on the high side and see what the 3rd quarter of the year brings us.

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