Disclaimer: this is the experience we had. At no point is this article representative for other experiences, nor is this article giving legal advice and I therefore cannot be held responsible for any action taken based on this article.
Recently, we have been looking into property in France and noticed, that – as with every country – the way how the process unfolds is rather different. We’ve come across quite a few obstacles and I decided that maybe I can help others with our experience. By the time of writing of this article, we have not found the property that we’re looking for yet. But even if we can help you just a little bit to get to where you want to be, I think it’s worth noting this all down. Once we have found our property, I’d happily update this post accordingly with all the other bits of things you need to know.
Let’s start with Google!
As a multilingual, that grew up in Germany, lived in France and is now a resident in the UK, I have to say the Google is supposed to make our lives easy. But unfortunately, this is not the case for people like us.
First of all, Google shows results of the country you are living in. Which, of course, makes sense to a certain degree. But if you are looking for things outside your country in a different language it gets very difficult.
For example: when I google for German information from within the UK, I get completely different results as my brother in Germany, even though the terms are exactly the same. Changing the language to German in your Google won’t change that. It just uses the German language, but still searches within that very country you live in. Particularly when you have to deal with paperwork (i.e. passports, government agencies, etc.) this can get very frustrating. But also when you are trying to find property.
When you google for property agencies from the UK, it will come with loads of property agents that also offer services in France, but unlike the standard websites in the UK (for example Rightmove) these will be very expensive services by property agents based in the UK, and they will make sure you’re paying dearly for their services of buying property in France. Even Rightmove offers this service, but of course it won’t have as many options as a local property agent (or even website) and most of the times, these are premium properties. Now if you are not rich, these won’t be for you (or for us, fort that matter!).
So after quite a lengthy search and adjusting search terms (and of course comparing notes with my brother’s search results from Germany) we found quite a few commonly used websites in Germany.
General property websites
SeLoger
I consider this the equivalent to the British Rightmove and German ImmobilienScout24. From what I could see, most property agents put their properties on here and properties can be found pretty much anywhere around the country. The website is easy to use, one feature in particular, is quite helpful: it lets you “hide” properties that you are not interested in.
Link: seloger.com
Bien’ici
This claims to have the most properties in France, but I have to say, as this may be applicable for areas like Paris or very touristy spots like the south of France, it doesn’t have quite as many in the countryside or not so well-known areas. The website has amazing (even luxurious) features, with maps, even 3D maps showing sunbeams projection (which of course is useless as no agent ever provides the address in the system). There is no filtering what properties have been seen already (only a little tag on the side that you already viewed it, not very comfortable to filter by hand).
Link: bienici.com
Logic-Immo
Quite honestly, I don’t understand this website. A login or account is not needed, but I am assuming it works with cookies on your PC to save/recover your searches and favourites. If you use – like me – a phone, a laptop and a desktop PC whenever you get a notification… then obviously that’s of no help. The website seems quite clunky and doesn’t work that well. Email notifications can be set up, but on one day I got 10x the same property sent by email, which clearly looked like a fault in the system, it seemed like placeholder. Even after I unsubscribed, I was still spammed for almost another 24h.
Link: logic-immo.com
Jinka
This website (or rather app) does not quite fit in any category. It is an aggregator, so scanning other platforms for new items and then displaying them in their own system. The app is limited but easy to handle. The website itself has barely any features but what it stands out is the filtering and display of the items. Somehow there seem two different teams at work, what’s great in the app is either bad or non-existent on the website and vice-versa. If you merged those two together, this would be a powerful tool!
Some of the collected ads only have like 1 or 2 photos and to see the rest you’re asked to go to the website of the original posting. Generally, not big of a deal, what’s annoying though: within the app, it uses an in-app browser, instead of using the phone browser. So not all features on all the websites work properly and neither does a simple link forward. So you still have to open the ad in your own browser (there is another button for that!) and then from there you can easily share the ad. That’s just too much work. Great ideas but badly patched together.
Link: jinka.fr
Classifieds
A Vendre A Louer
This website does not work for me and I can’t figure out why. Once again, it looks like there are two competing systems at work and the developers have not been able to merge them together. Within the website suddenly the design changes, the menu is completely different, as if a new design was introduced but not rolled out all the way. When I try to find my searches – for weeks now – it says an error occurred and I should try again later, with no success over the last 8 weeks or so. The search also doesn’t seem to be quite accurate for some reason so eventually I gave up on this site.
Link: avendrealouer.fr
Particulier A Particulier / Entre Particulier
Mainly a general classifieds portal with an additional property feature. I barely used them, pretty much all the items were already on other platforms. Particularly as it’s meant from person to person, rather than agency, I found that very few properties on the countryside are offered privately without a property agent. So not much of a use to us.
Links: pap.fr and entreparticulier.com
News Sites
Le Figaro
Le Figaro also offers a property portal. Somehow, based on the design, features (and basing this on my memory as well) it seems like it’s an older, less feature-rich version of SeLoger that has been integrated into their website. Occasionally we come across something that hasn’t been posted anywhere else, so I’d give it a try.
Link: immobilier.lefigaro.fr
There will be more, but so far we've only tried this one.
Property Agents (the big ones)
notaires.fr
Generally, this is the go-to address for all the properties that have been put online by their sellers through their own dedicated notary public (or in English the equivalent of a solicitor). It seems that these listings don’t come with extra fees (for the seller or the buyer) other than the standard notary fees. But unfortunately, not many people make use of this feature. Mostly because property agencies put a bit more effort into publishing ads (like printouts in their windows, advertising, and mailing lists) whilst this is simply just a website “that exists”. If you’re lucky you find the same property from an agent also on the notary website and additional fees for either seller or buyer can be bypassed. 😉
Link: immobilier.notaires.fr
EffiCity
So far, we had a very bad experience with this agency. EffiCity seems to run on some sort of a franchise system. All their agents seem self-employed.
The one we came across had a very good property and we were told that first sale didn’t go through so the seller decided to give it another go and enlist the property for auction. We won the auction but were not notified by the agent about it. When we contacted the agent two days later, we were told that she got more offers after the auction by email which she forwarded to the seller and didn’t care to notify us about it. When questioning the attitude she only said that it wasn’t an “official auction with an auctioneer and a gavel” but only an auction to attract more interest. My comment, that it’s odd that it is rather odd not being approached or even given the opportunity to put a better bid in then, she said we can always put another offer in, but failed to tell us how high it should be. Altogether we lost complete trust and decided to just leave it at that. It’s particularly annoying if you drive 600km to see the property and then you’re being treated like that.
Out of interest I had our current property evaluated, as their website offered “free evaluation” and of course, nothing is for free… the next day I had a call from a different EffiCity agent trying to put our property on the market. I pointed out I only used their service on the website as it was advertised for free and I was curious, but I also pointed out why I would not be planning to use their service. Up to that point the agent was quite chatty, explaining they all work differently and not all have bad attitudes. Well, after the description of above situation, that agent has not been in touch anymore either. That roughly gives you an idea what they are like. Generally, reviews on other platforms like TrustPilot are also not very favourable.
Link: efficity.com
SAFTI
They also seem to work on a Franchise or self-employment basis. So far, we tried to get hold of – I think – 5 agents and only one ever replied. As from our experience, they have been utterly useless.
Link: safti.fr
iad France
Once more, they are using “independent” agents for this network as well. The website is OK, no major flaw or annoyances, but I had the feeling that there are not that many offers to see on the countryside either. Their website states that they are now expanding in Europe and now in the US as well, but I suppose they will be more popular or useful in the bigger cities. One big advantage here is, that the website is also available in English. However, that is of little help, when all the agents only enter French texts themselves.
Link: iadfrance.com
In conclusion
There will be plenty more websites and agencies out there that could potentially help. Once you start with the basic ones like SeLoger, you will notice that all the agencies will make sure, that their logo, name or own website is listed somewhere. Usually you then can either access their own local branch website directly or google them.
As I am partially deaf, I am heavily relying on written communication. And in general, I have to admit that the French are not very good with that. Generally customer service is quite bad in France, but if you don't get an answer within 24h you can generally assume that they will not reply to you at all. This may be, because they really can't be bothered, but it's also possible that the property is already under offer and they then decide you're not worth their effort anymore.
So if you can, try and call, best with someone that talks French if you can't speak French yourself. English is not always the first foreign language learnt in France and many don't really speak it that well (they claim).