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Who's Visiting Your Property When You're Not? - European Holiday Home Rental |
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The dream of owning
a holiday home can turn into a nightmare if you’ve no way of dealing
with problems at your property when you’re back home in the UK.
Jacquie Clavey looks at ways to make sure your holiday home stays
problem-free while you’re away. Plenty of people
simply close the shutters, lock the door and bid au revoir to their
holiday home until they return the following summer. Blesses with fair
weather and the sort of neighbours who make it their business to know
who’s coming and going, chances are there’ll be little to worry about
in their absence. “We just close the
property up, then when we go down the following May we simply sweep out
the spiders and give the place an airing – or better still we let
friends go down first then they can sweep the spiders out”, says Susan
Robinson, a headmistress from Essex who for the past eight years has spent
her summer holidays at her village house in the Languedoc with her family. Not everybody is quite
so relaxed about leaving their property though, and some houses simply
take more looking after than others. A small village house
with no garden won’t take as much upkeep as a detached property with
grounds in an isolated position. There
is also the question of whether you want to spend your holidays doing all
the little jobs that need doing, or whether you would rather have somebody
else go in before you arrive to cut the lawn and do any repairs, leaving
you to simply enjoy being there and relaxing. You may be lucky
enough to have a friendly neighbour who you can leave a key with and who
will pop in once a month or so to keep an eye on things.
Alternatively a property maintenance or security service where any
problems can be sorted out there an then may suit you better. Carol Nunes and her
partner bought their holiday home in Vienne last July.
They currently visit the house once every two to three months but
hope to retire there permanently within the next three years.
When they are not in France their house is looked after by Chris
and Georgina Ward, a British couple who offer a property maintenance
service in the Poitou-Charentes region. “They check on the
property once a month or more if there’s work we need them to do,”
explains Carol. “Their
services are invaluable to us, we cannot believe our luck in having found
them”. Finding the right
people to look after your house will depend on many factors, such as your
location, your budget and the type of service you are looking for.
The classified ads in FPN are a good place to start while asking
around amongst other British holiday home owners in the area can produce
recommendations. Looking after other
people’s holiday homes is one of the main sources of income for British
people moving to France. But
while Chris and Georgina Ward’s clients speak highly of their services,
there are plenty of other people for whom taking on a caretaker has not
been a satisfactory experience. Some people charging
an hourly rate have been known to be less than scrupulous about actually
carrying out the work they have charged for, others lack the necessary
knowledge or skills to do the maintenance that is required. If you want your
caretaker to carry our repairs and do work on the property you need to be
happy with the level of their workmanship and knowledge.
If the person you are considering has renovated their own property
then it is a good idea to visit them at home to check out the quality of
their work. Alternatively, ask to visit some of their existing clients,
who should also be able to tell you whether they fell they are charge a
fair rate for the work carried out. If
you want your caretaker to organise services through other sub-contractors
you will want to be sure their French language skills are adequate as
misunderstandings at your expense could prove costly. Chris and Georgina
Ward charge an hourly rate of 15 euros (c£10), including travelling time.
Sometimes they pop into a property for half an hour to check for
problems such as frozen pipes, at other times they will spend longer if
there is a particular task to be carried out.
“Old properties need constant work,” says Chris.
“Even if they are in A1 order when you buy them they still need
work doing and the ones that aren’t maintained soon go downhill.” For some people, a
major problem with their property persuades them of the need to have
somebody taking care of things in their absence.
Paul Thulborn who runs Marine Security has probably heard more
tales than most about the sort of things that can go wrong. “One person came to
us after a pipe burst in his property.
The water meter kept ticking and he ended up with a £2,000 water
bill,” he relates. “Another
client had a similar problem – he thought he’d turned off his water
but there was still a quarter of a turn to go on the stopcock, a pipe
burst and he ran up a £700 bill.” While some problems
will be covered by insurance, Paul points out that insurance companies can
be loathe to pay up for damage which could have been limited by swifter
action. “One person came to
us recently after three quarters of his roof had been blown off in a storm
and he hadn’t discovered it until 18 months later,” says Paul.
“His insurers are unlikely to look favourably on the situation
because it took him so long to report it.” Although property
crime in France is generally slightly less prevalent than it is in the UK
in most areas, Paul’s experience of dealing with break-ins is that where
they happen they tend to be ruthless and the property can be stripped
bare. “If people do get
hit, they’ll strip the place right out, even down to the light bulbs and
taking the wiring out of the roof,” he says.
“They’ll literally take everything they can carry away – and
if you get hit once, the chances are you will get hit again.” Paul recommends a
burglar alarm if you property is particularly isolated: “It takes a long
time for a burglar to take apart a house, so if you have an alarm
connected to us by a telephone line we can contact the local gendarmerie
immediately and follow it up with a visit ourselves.” As well as installing
intruder alarms, Marine Security, which operates a service whereby
somebody visits the property at agreed intervals for £50 per visit.
Paul recommends a visit every two to three weeks, although some of
his clients with more expensive properties like a weekly visit, others
less frequent. Each visit lasts up to
half a day and a video diary is made of the property inspection and any
problems discovered. The
video is sent to the property owner who, having watched it, returns the
tape for the next visit to be recorded on to it.
The client will generally be telephoned from the premises and if
possible, any problems will be fixed there and then. Other requirements can
be quoted for and arranged thorough sub-contractors. In principle the
company could even organise a changeover during the visit if you are
letting your property, although there is a limit to how many visits can be
fitted in on a Saturday. According to Paul the
important thing is to give the impression that somebody is around: “If
there’s a car there we will move it to a different position, we’ll
change the settings on the light timers, or perhaps we’ll put out a load
of washing and bring it in later,” he says. Chris and Georgina Ward Tel: 0033 (0) 5 4929 1677 Paul Thulborn, Marine Security Tel: 01626 365282 When
the cat’s away, don’t let the mice play ….
The most cost effective way to target your holiday home to prospective clients is to use the Internet - Click into jmlvillas.com to find out more. Article from French Property News
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