Dordogne property market -The summer update
THIS summer in the Dordogne has been a scorcher and there's no sign of it ending anytime soon.
If only the property market in the Dordogne was as hot as the weather. We got off to a good start in June. It's no secret that we're heavily dependant on a buoyant UK economy down here. For several consecutive months running up to the start of the summer we watched UK housing price indices rise and indeed June was a good month.
Last month, according to the FNAIM, the Federation of Estate Agents in France, the market stabilised with modest house price rises of around 0.4%. However, they're still sticking to their original pessimistic prediction of price drops between 5 and 10% over the whole of 2009.
We don't need any analyst surveys to tell us about how sluggish the housing market was in August in the Dordogne. There are several reasons for this. Firstly, France shuts down for the holiday season in August. Secondly, the British stayed at home for the holiday season this year and thirdly, Mervyn King, the Governer of the Bank of England, recently broke the news that the UK can look forward to an even longer and more painful recession than previously predicted.
A recent French TV report cited a drop of 30% in the number of British holidaymakers to the Dordogne village of Eymet for this year.
But, that said, there are some very positive signs. Enquiries through our website have spiked and the diary is filling up quickly for September and even early October. Average budgets are up too but we're not too sure yet why that is.
Vendors await September with enthusiasm. It's a time of year generally regarded as the time when the "serious buyers" arrive in the Dordogne.
After a slow summer, vendors continue to be realistic in their expectations and, if they are serious about selling - and, for the most part, they are - then they are ready to negotiate.
We think we now have most of the right ingredients for a brisk autumn for the property market in the Dordogne but for the Brits, of course, there's one key element missing; the exchange rate.
After a reasonably long rally to around 1.17 the pound has fallen back quite a bit against the euro and was just over 1.13 at the time of writing.
We remain optimistic. Let's wait to see how it goes in September.
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Comments
Great comments. Thanks. And
Great comments. Thanks. And some interesting points. It is very much a buyers market here in the Dordogne at the moment. I agree. And it's not just the housing market. I had lunch with a friend last week whose son is at university in Bordeaux. He told me of the plat du jour price war among all the restaurants in the city. "Nobody will pay more than 11 euros for their lunch in any restaurant in Bordeaux" he said. So, there has been a shift of power in favour of the consumer which ,of course, drives prices down.
We've all heard about Ryan Air pulling out of Manchester Airport in the UK because they weren't prepared to pay the £3 per passenger charge for landing and take off. They simply said they'd take their business elsewhere. Another great example of consumer muscle flexing.
But, we see the effect of this shift of power in other walks of business life everywhere. Take ebay, for example. They now offer big name brands like Speedo and Nike the opportunity to buy an ebay "microsite" off the shelf as a platform to auction their wares. So, there's no such thing as fixed pricing on any product and a it sells for what a buyer is prepared to pay for it.
It raises all sorts of possibilities for property markets. I actually believe that the "make me a offer" culture is here already. It's just not advertised that way. And it only works in the current economic climate. If I take an example from just this week. An offer of 180,000 euros was made on a house advertised at 265,000 but the owner was prepared to accept somewhere in the region of 230,000. It sold for 220,000. That's a lot of different numbers being bandied about. So, what is the true value of the property? The answer is, of course, 220,000 but only for this particular combination of buyer and seller. He may have got the asking price from another buyer. Who knows? The point is that restaurants, airports, footwear companies and now property vendors are acutely aware of this massive power shift in favour of the consumer and the smart ones embrace it without losing their shirt in the process. After all, the trick in any transaction is that everybody feels they got a good deal.
Interesting read. I've just
Interesting read. I've just come back from a house hunting trip in the Dordogne. I didn't buy this time round but it was a productive trip none the less. I noticed that there are some good price reductions to be had. So much so that I wondered what the point was of agents advertising a price on a property at all.
Asking prices are only a guide. I think people selling their house would be better off to say "make me an offer". It's a buyers' market in the Dordogne at the moment. Don't know about other parts of the country. I don't think that if you want to buy a property that you should stick rigidly to looking within your budget. Look above it and try the "make me an offer" idea. You may well be pleasantly surprised!! Good luck.
Hello GP, Many thanks for
Hello GP,
Many thanks for your comment. Interesting that you think those people who had it in mind to buy in France before "the crisis" will not be deterred because of it.
As the article says, that certainly seems to be how things are heading with the diary quickly filling up for September.
We're glad you like the site.
Hi and thanks for the
Hi and thanks for the update. Very useful. I just wanted to say that I have been made redundant recently from my work in the north of england. For my family and I this has turned out to be a blessing in disguise. It has given us the opportunity to move to the Dordogne now having visied on holiday for many years. I don't think that unemployment and bad economic news in the UK is enough to deter people from moving to France. In anything I think people are more likely to make the move sooner than planned because things are in such a mess over here. Life's too short! Great site by the way. GP
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