JC: I am very happy that you have come to see us at the Polish Agents Around The World event.
DN: We are very happy too.
JC: It was not easy to find two professionals in France who meet all these expectations we had from our partners.
Beyond just finding a property, which you can do with different brokers around the world, it’s important to manage that property afterwards.
JC: And I know that you guys do that right?
DN: Yes, yes, yes, as part of our business we serve the client comprehensively. That is, first of all we find, broker the purchase and sale of the property, but then we do the so-called whole setup of the client on site. Here, Ania is a specialist in all kinds of account set-up.
AM: Well, yes, that’s my experience, because I spent a dozen years in banking and private banking. First in Nice, then in Monaco, then I worked in asset management and multi family office in Monaco. And that’s actually how I realised that an international client, a premium client, needs to have a so-called phone call to a friend in extreme situations, and unfortunately these extreme situations are very many because you are abroad.
Not everyone speaks French and such a friend is very much needed. We help our clients, not only as Dominika said in the setup, that is, when a client comes to France or Monaco, installs, rents or buys a house or a flat. But also it’s all the banking services, help with setting up an account, with credit very often. All tax services, that is, help with tax payments, help with insurance.
It’s a very wide range of services, and in fact our customers know that they can count on us, and that it’s not just, as Dominika says, – just buying a property, it’s all this service, including after-sales.
JC: It’s very necessary, being in Poland at the same time as owning property abroad.
Often for you this is a barrier to buying property abroad right there, a lack of security.
DN: That’s what our customers appreciate about us, that they can just write us a message and immediately have some kind of answer, whether we go to the property or send someone from our trusted colleagues to the property to check what’s going on.
Well, because obviously that first stage, when we buy, is fantastic, sometimes it’s difficult, you have to help, but that next stage, when the property is standing empty for a few months of the year, it just also needs work and dealing with.
JC: Does it have to stand empty? Can it be rented out?
DN: It can be rented out, of course, but there are certain services that need to be done with renting it out too. Exactly, exactly like that. But of course a property in France can also be rented.
JC: What kind of return can a client expect when buying a property in France? I know many of you, from experience in Portugal, that when you buy a property abroad, you plan to spend a few weeks in the property. The rest of the time, however, you hand the property over to professionals for short- and long-term rental.
How does this work?
DN: Yes, it does happen. But there is a cautionary note for you who will be buying a property in France, one strictly to rent out, to make a profit, because we have clients who simply have their own property and don’t want that. They don’t need it for someone else to live in. They’re giving the property to friends, family, to spend their holidays, and that’s very important when buying a property like this.
And this is where the role of the agent, the broker, comes in. Because there are some buildings where we buy flats where this short-term rental is simply not possible, because it’s banned. So that’s what we need to know at the time of buying a property.
JC: And that’s written down somewhere, how does that work?
DN: That works in a so-called cooperative where there are special regulations and you have to combine. The building has its own regulations. And this is precisely because simply some flat owners do not wish, for example, for the tenants to change every day. So here we always advise customers to find out beforehand and read the regulations very carefully. so that there are simply no surprises later on.
JC: Tell me, what is the entry threshold? Like if I wanted to buy a two-bedroom like this with some sort of terrace, with a nice view of the water. How much money do you have to have to buy a property?
DN: It also depends. Two bedrooms with a view overlooking the sea. In a place like Cannes, Antibes, Nice, I think it’s over €400,000.
JC: And so luxurious. Because there’s probably such a barrier to entry. Like if I wanted to buy a property up to the standard here of maybe Zlota, Cosmopolitan, it’s bad construction, because there the construction is probably lower, but in such one of the more luxurious properties?
DN: That we have to count more or less around 10-12 thousand euros per metre. So that’s an 80-90 m2 flat, about just 800-900 thousand euros, that’s more or less how much it will cost.
JC: And many Poles are coming forward to you?
DN: More and more, more and more, and maybe because of this political situation.
JC: Well, exactly how has it affected you?
AM: Avalanche by avalanche. And the demand is also not just for real estate, but also for multi family office type services.
DN: Yes, but we are also seeing more and more of our potential clients looking for houses to buy,
JC: But also to live in? Or all the time as a second home
DN & AM: Second home precisely. That you can spend those five, six months a year there so you don’t become a tax resident.
JC: Exactly, and why do clients avoid it? Because there are destinations where clients even want residency.
AM: Monaco, for example. That’s like a different issue, because actually in Monaco you can be a resident and you don’t even have to buy a property to become one. You can simply rent a property, sign a long-term contract, open a bank account and then undergo the whole procedure of becoming a tax resident in Monaco.
Obviously, this is very attractive because then there are no taxes, no taxation on your income, as an individual. This is very interesting, however, the cost involved is quite high, and in France, as you know, taxes are very high.
JC: What are the taxes in France? What are the taxes, the basic threshold tax?
DN: When you buy a property in France, it’s the so-called cadastral tax that we have to pay every year.
JC: It depends on the value of the property.
DN: It’s not just on the value, it’s on the potential rental of the property, on where the property is located. We more or less assume and explain it in such a way that if the client potentially rented the property, the amount of one month’s rent also had to go to the cadastral tax.
AM: Then there is another tax called taxe d’habitaton, which is a tax on living in a property, which we hope will soon disappear. That was promised, for the moment it’s there all the time. And now yes, if you rent such a property as a permanent tenant, then normally this tenant should pay this tax.
In the case of a once-in-a-lifetime, or short-term rental, it’s actually the owner who pays the tax – so there are two taxes associated with the property. And when it comes to taxes on the individual, as Dominica said, there are threshold taxes that can go up to 45%, so they are quite high taxes.
And there is one very important thing not to forget. There’s also a tax in France that you don’t have anywhere else in the world – the fortune tax – it’s been changed and now it’s only a tax on property that a person owns in France, on French territory.
So if a client owns property for more than 1 300 000, the threshold taxation starts.
DN: But there are also ways around that.
JC: Then let’s not give everything away anymore today.
DN: That’s if you wanted to know, we have ways of doing it. There are some mechanisms that allow us to bypass the split. Either increase or decrease. Yes. It’s also not that we want to discourage you from buying on the Côte d’Azur, because it’s such a destination that….
JC: Well, just tell us about this destination, what is it about the Côte d’Azur? Why do clients choose this destination?
DN: I fell in love with the Côte d’Azur a very, very long time ago, and we also have this romantic love somewhere in our background, partly as romance writers. I think there are several elements to it. First of all, it’s such a traditional destination, where since the nineteenth century all the European aristocracy came, interestingly enough, to spend the winter. Fashionable, it was very fashionable then. And thanks to this foreign funding, luxury hotels, restaurants, the whole infrastructure was built. And that became throughout the 19th and 20th century, it was the place to be. And I think it has stayed that way until now. Because first of all we have this whole infrastructure, we have a very high quality of service. We have demanding, discerning customers. And I also think that all these events that take place on the Côte d’Azur make customers want to be here.
We have the Cannes festival and the Monaco festival, the Monaco Grand Prix, we have the Rolex Master Tennis Club, all sorts of races, yacht shows, the Monaco Yacht Show, all sorts of fairs in Cannes that are happening, Cannes is also such a great great place to invest if you want to rent out your property later on a short-term basis to tourists.
AM: Yes, very much so.
DN: Well the clients, the so-called congress clients and we have a minimum of twice every month over the course of the year there are congresses in Cannes and then Cannes is 100% full, so that rental return is quite high.
JC: And what are the air connections like?
DN: Well, that’s great too, because there are actually direct flights now, so there’s both LOT and Wizzair two hours from Warsaw and two hours from Krakow, and that’s LOT which, before the pandemic, was flying almost every day, four-five times a week.
Nice airport is the second largest airport in France after Paris Charles de Gaulle, so these connections to the whole world are great. On top of that, we have Nice airport with the first airport when it comes to private jets, so there is somewhere to put the plane. If you can’t find a place in Nice, Cannes airport also accepts small planes.
AM: You might as well also fly from Nice by helicopter to Monaco, for example.
JC: That’s already for the more affluent, premium clientele.
DN: I would even say no – even that was the case before the pandemic. We used to laugh that it was a kind of helicopter bus, because you just bought a seat in the helicopter and in just six minutes you’re there.
JC: Would you say what the cost was?
DN: Yes, it was such a cost between €95-110, so a super deal if you want to get to Cannes, Monaco or even St Tropez quickly for an event or congress.
It’s a really great connection and we know it’s going to see a resurgence because we’re coming out of a pandemic, so it’s probably going to go back to the way it used to be.
JC: Girls, I thank you so much.
DN & AM:
Thank you.
JC: It was a very interesting conversation. I think it has brought you closer to the real estate market in the south of France. And well, it only remains for us to invite you to work with us, with Anna and with Dominique. You can find our contact details on our website. And let’s say goodbye in French.
DN:
In that case, we won’t say goodbye, but
à bientôt!
see also Property on the Côte d’Azur
