This does seem obvious but many people don’t. For some reason they place finding the property higher up the list. When you have some experience of the industry then you’ll be in a better position to determine what you want from your property! It’s fairly straight forward finding work in the chalet business. There are plenty of companies looking for chalet staff. Primarily over the summer but also around January too (replacing the “fallout” from the beginning of the season). You’ll probably be provided with some training and you’ll be able to learn from your mistakes (and those of the company you are working for). A word of advice on this subject. Don’t get a job with an independent chalet operator in the town you want to set up you business in, then attempt to “steal” some of their existing clients and then set up your own business in the same village! It happens, fairly frequently and it’s not nice!
Choose your ski resort.
You might have already done this. In fact you might decide that your clientel will be much like yourself, will enjoy the same type of skiing and ski resort at your self and so this will be straightforward. Though maybe you’d like to get off the beaten track and introduce skiers to something new! That sounds like a risky business to me. Much easier to stick with an established market. It might be tempting to think that there are some resorts that will offer better value for money when it comes to buying a property. I’m not sure that this is the case. In general the property prices reflect the popularity of a resort and the length of season, so the more expensive resorts probably are more popular, have longer seasons and enable you to charge more for the holidays.
Do your business plan, to be continued.
Choose your property.
Most people assume they will be buying their first property. This is fine. For years I have said that the real winners in the chalet business are the owners of the properties. That was over the period 2000 until about 2008 and was down to the large increase in capital value of the properties. If you don’t have enough money to buy a property then renting is the next best thing. Bear in mind that the big tour operators all rent their properties. It offers flexibility, they can increase or decrease their stock of property relatively quickly and they don’t have to have an enormous amount of capital tied up. Finding a property is easy after a bad season, their will be a few operators winding up their operations or downsizing but you’ll need to be “on site”, finding a property to rent in the Alps is virtually impossible via the internet!
We’ve just been experiencing one of the “wettest” starts to a season for a long time. We are not complaining. It seems that up until December we’d had one of the driest years on record. Of course “wet” can mean many things. We prefer to use the term “precipitation”, so that can cover rain and snow. The local paper reports that it rained on 26 days out of 31 in Annecy in December 2011. Yesterday we suffered a miserable day in the mountains with rain up to about 1800m at times. Thankfully it turned to snow late in the day. Today the weather had cleared so Lee Massey (covers Morzine for Alpine Property) and I bunked off work this morning to check out the conditions. Lets just say we were pleasantly surprised.
The weather is due to close in tonight so expect some more snow, and they are forecasting heavy snow on Thursday. Keep abreast with the weather around the northern alps by logging into our weather page
The last stages of finishing off a renovation “project” are often overlooked, the furnishing and decorating of the newly renovated apartment or chalet are left to the owners to undertake – a daunting enough task close to home. Most of the renovations managed by members of the Alpine Property team are finished off by professionals, you’d imagine that this would push the cost up even more, it doesn’t have to. Especially if you take into account the amount of time you would need to finish the job. Time better spent enjoying the finished product!
Liz Ockelton – MAKE SPACE DESIGNS (www.makespacedesigns.com) has just finished 3 projects this autumn. Here are some of the results.
1. Chalet La Roche SAMOENS – sold by Denis Barbier of Alpine Property refurbished in 2010 and renovations recently completed by MSD adding an extra bedroom and now 4 new bathrooms. The original property listing is here. A selection of photos of the updated chalet are below.
2. La Christiana MORZINE – sold by Lee Massey of Alpine Property though before it ended up on the website. Newly furnished by MSD ready for Dec 2011
3. BONNEVAUX farm, sold by Claudia / Ed. Chalet Bonnevaux. The original listing is here, this old farm was habitable but is now being renovated. Currently under construction due to be complete Dec 2011 / Jan 2012.
We are currently experiencing a “major snow event” here in the French Alps, 100km/hr winds, and heavy snow now for the last couple of days. I was allowed out of the office on a training course yesterday. Avalanche training that is. A very short video is available below.
Just getting to the venue was tricky enough. Today is the day before the season starts properly which means there are still loads of HGV’s on the road, combine that with the snow and narrow roads and you can imagine the consequences.
The avalanche risk is almost universally 5/5 across the Alps today and will probably remain that way tomorrow. Our local ski areas of Avoriaz and Morzine / Les Gets are both closed which I’m told is “unprecedented”, I certainly can’t remember that happening in the 12 years I have lived here.
I’ve been meaning to blog these pictures for a while. The beautiful weather we are having promoted me to get on with it. On the weekend we had some cold wet weather, the upshot is that when the sun returned on Monday the vistas were incredible.
This picture has was taken by the webcam at 10am on Monday 19/9/2011, it’s situated at 2120m between Samoens and Flaine.
By Thursday afternoon almost all the snow has gone.
Which brings me to the photos I had in mind. The first was taken at the begining of December last year.
It was taken by one of the Alpine Property agents, advertising an apartment in St Jean d’Aulps, Apt Bayard, it reminds me of something Russian?
Followed by this one, taken a day later, by a photographer who works with the Tourist Office in St Jean d’Aulps, 100m away from the point of view used above.
Now I know St Jean d’Aulps is pretty, but I would not go beyond that, this photographer makes this little village look world class. Take a look at the albums on this link
To me, St Gervais has always felt like a classy Victorian resort town. Well established and for valid reasons too. Good access to the skiing in Megève, Les Contaminés-Montjoie and even Les Houches (Chamonix). Transport in and out is also easy, it’s just about 1hr from Geneva airport and it’s connected to the railway at the bottom of the hill via a funiculair. Don’t forget the spa baths as well.
Thanks to these positive points the town has continued to go from strength to strength, the centre of St Gervais is smart and well looked after and the shops are on the up and up, for instance there is the recently expanded and upmarket shop Unlimited Sports that has just gained much sort after contracts with Eider and Burton and the new gastro deli which is an extension of the existing fine dining restaurant Le Serac.
If you want to stop for a coffee outside there is endless choice. Further evidence of the affluence of the town and the forward thinking Maire is the new bridge that is being constructed that will allow traffic to avoid the town centre. This major project will transform the town again.
Apartment Le Splendide is a good example of the private investment that has occurred during this time. This lovely penthouse apartment has been converted professionally by a interior designer and it shows. Situated bang in the middle of town in a period building.
The mixture of old and new means they have preserved the original French windows updated them with double glazed panes, these large windows offer great views of the town, Aravis mountain range and the St Gervais ski area. There is plenty of parking nearby and a small park just 50m away. When the bridge is finished you’ll even be able to walk to the ski lift! The current price is a steal, there is nothing that comes close on a euros/m2 basis. Full details, photos, plans and 360′s can be found on the Alpine Property website.
It never ceases to amaze me how Les Carroz has remained such a well kept secret. It is such a hidden gem! It seems that this secret is out though….this January edition of the Easyjet magazine has featured it as as one of ’4 fabulous European ski resorts’ ‘to slope off for a ski break’ http://www.ink-live.com/emagazines/easyjet-inflight/2011/jan/
It is renowned for having some of the best snow in Europe despite being a medium height resort. Even now after a whole month without significant dumps of snow, you can still ski right back down to the bottom into the village whilst many other resorts have become unskiable low down. This is not only due to its micro-climate, being in such close proximity to Mont Blanc but also to the phenomenal abilities of those tending the slopes whilst we are relaxing at the end of a hard day’s ski. Visitors from other resorts are amazed at the condition of our slopes!
Les Carroz is in the Grand Massif, just 45 minutes from Geneva and one of the closest resorts time-wise from the UK so is great for short breaks too. No long transfers! If you leave the UK on an early morning flight you can be skiing the very same afternoon. It has heaps of stunning skiing for all levels within the tree-line and has 265km of marked pistes and loads of fabulous off-piste to explore too. It is a short ski over to Flaine for high altitude skiing giving it access to one of the longest runs in Europe, a 15km blue run through the most magnificent nature reserve. An absolute must is stopping halfway down and being picked up by Lolo from the Chalet du Lac de Gers. She’ll throw you a rope and pull you up the mountain behind her skidoo to the cosy restaurant with the most amazing views and wonderful meals!
The Chalet du Lac de Gers in autumn.
Having recently moved away from Les Carroz after 9 wonderful years, I now appreciate fully how spoilt we were there and realise all the true splendours of this beautiful village nestling on the mountainside. Each year there is more investment and each year more thought goes into offering the visitor a huge variety of activities to choose from whilst maintaining its authentic Frenchness.
We are often asked about how much it costs to sell a property in France. The answer is fairly straightforward. I’ll illustrate it with a (hypothetical) example, taken from our website, of an individual chalet.
So for this chalet it would be a 5% commission, we’ll have to add TVA to this so the relevant figure for the seller is 5.98%. This will leave
559,419 euros for the (hypothetical) seller.
There will also be various surveys that will have to have been undertaken.
Energy / Asbestos and Lead / Electrical integrity, together these bills will amount to about 500 euros
Leaving 558,919 euros for the seller.
From this any capital gain will need to be calculated. If this is a primary residence then there will be no CGT to pay. If this is a secondary home then CGT will need to be calculated, the French government have a method of making sure this payment is not avoided! If the seller is not resident in France he will need to take this into account, if the property is sold for more than 150,000 euros (as in this case) the French government will want a guarantee that the CGT liability will be paid, in practice this guarantee is offered by a third party Tax Representative (example: SARF), their fee would normally be 1% of the amount realised by the seller. So in all cases where the seller is not resident in France (even if there has not been a Capital Gain in the value of the property), count on another 1% fee. which will leave:
553,330 euros for the seller.
You’ll see that I have not mentioned any legal fees, these are paid for by the buyer.
Update: October 2011. There have been some changes to the CGT situation in France. The SARF have got a handy calculator to help
Alpine Property are proud sponsors of the young players’ teams at Chamonix Golf Club this season.
Our connection with golf in Chamonix started a while ago with our involvement in the famous Chamonix Ryder Cup, an annual competition between locals and the rest of the world, where we were shirt sponsors for many years. This year however we decided to support young golfers at the initiative of JC Skiera, our local representative (and Chamonix Golf Club member) with the support of teaching pro Jean-Claude Bonnaz and head of the Chamonix Golf School Claudio Peaquin. Sporting their new colours of Orange, White or Fushia, Chamonix’s promising youngsters will be wearing their team shirts at competitive events throughout the season.
The affordability of property in the Alps continues to improve for British buyers. Since Sterling reached an historic low against the Euro (£1 = 1.06 €) in Oct 2009 the rates have been improving until we reached a recent high (£1=1.16€) this week.
Combine this with price reductions over the same period and some properties are looking 20% cheaper to a British buyer when compared to the Autumn of last year.
A couple of chalets that have come down in price this week.
Posted by Gareth 
