To give you any idea you need to give us a rough locationHi guys
Apologies, first time poster here as it were. I have read through entire post (some time ago), and I could post a million questions and do have a great deal of research to do, but thought I'd pose a couple of quickies up for consensus. I'm not coming from a blinkered view of 'wow look at this property' as there would be a hell of a lot of due diligence, but want to just get some ideas on bits and pieces to maybe investigate further.
I would love to move over to France, and it's the only place my wife will consider moving to outside of the UK. We have young kids (4 yo and 18 months). Ideal world situation I would like 'some' land for the freedom etc. That said, I have a Degree in Ag from Harper, and whilst I don't work in agriculture now, my parents still farm and I've been brought up with that background.
There is a property on the market we fancy investigating further; nice house, old-style barns and 50+ acres of pasture with some woodland. From what I can see, cattle graze it currently - no idea on what arrangements that is done under; there is no mention of tenancy within the scant information. The property is on the market for a touch more than our UK house is valued at, with the potential to add a couple of bedrooms quite easily. As far as I can see it's being marketed as a house with pretensions rather than a farm - there's no mention of any subsidy/title anywhere that I can see either.
I currently work as a business/marketing consultant, predominantly from home. I had had the notion that if I plan block return trips to the UK I could potentially make it work, but as I come further along the line think this would be difficult. It might be possible, maybe it's a case of scaling back to just the clients with whom I know it can work... All that said, with maybe £60K 'extra' mortgage to cover on what we have now, can we we make that acreage return enough to move even if it is more of a subsistence life (If I was to say broadly in UK terms I think that would be a mortgage of sub-£1K/month still) I'm certainly not afraid of moving back to agriculture, and appreciate there is investment on that side of the business if we were to go that way.
I have a couple of ideas of a little niche tourism that we could investigate at a small scale to potentially help things along. What are the realities for a smaller scale farm operation such as that? My thoughts if we were considering in the UK would be the 'straight to market' route of value-adding from the product (lamb/beef on the grazing, pigs possibly in the woodland (if there are no truffles...). Does this stand in France or are there too many hurdles? As a very rough rule of thumb, how do the types of figures in Nix transpose to France (so I can do some fag packet calculations).
Apologies for the waffly, slightly indirect post, but I just want to get a feel for what may be possible.
Thanks for the feedback, yes I agree on the proximity to airports. As I said in my post though, it's a case of looking at not necessarily supporting through my existing business - but from what you've said it's not going to be a great area to look at it by the sounds of it...
Don't get me wrong it's a very nice area, but grass growing here is nothing like the UK so you need a lot more land than you would in the UK. We are about a cow to the ha here and that's sucklers, and some years you can end up feeding more forage in the summer than the winter.
Thanks for the info, most interesting!muppetdave
if you're under 40 and willing to fill out forms you will get lots of help including zero % loans, installation grants etc etc... if your wife starts a business there is a cheap loan for female entrepreneurs too.
french-farm-grants.com carries a database and information on how and where to apply.
good luck.
Out of interest which grants have you applied for and got, and what were your experiences of the french system and are you marketing what you produce and if so how and which part of france are you installed in,muppetdave
if you're under 40 and willing to fill out forms you will get lots of help including zero % loans, installation grants etc etc... if your wife starts a business there is a cheap loan for female entrepreneurs too.
french-farm-grants.com carries a database and information on how and where to apply.
good luck.
Sounds like weve got a new expert !Out of interest which grants have you applied for and got, and what were your experiences of the french system and are you marketing what you produce and if so how and which part of france are you installed in,
thanks
Sounds like weve got a new expert !
Incomes up 15 % i see, wounder what all the protests were for then !I've an idea who it is
muppetdave
if you're under 40 and willing to fill out forms you will get lots of help including zero % loans, installation grants etc etc... if your wife starts a business there is a cheap loan for female entrepreneurs too.
french-farm-grants.com carries a database and information on how and where to apply.
good luck.
It was but its just more level for some than others
I thought one of the points of the eu was to create a level playing field
WillOut of interest which grants have you applied for and got, and what were your experiences of the french system and are you marketing what you produce and if so how and which part of france are you installed in,
thanks
Have you done this yourself?Will
The grants are no free lunch you have to invest too. Finding your own 60% of the project costs can be difficult. With 3 grants mounting to more than €50k of grants for planting and construction my 60% investment is €75k.
The french grant system does as it says, supports the health and welfare of the local rural community. Grants are apportioned locally so any application has an immediate advantage. But you need to prove the business case.
On "level playing field" comments in the UK the average payment per ha is €230 while france is €296. France pays in more and tops up grant programs with govt money too.