Estate Agents And Other Pond Scum ...

Contrary to what one might think, buying or selling a house in France is in fact a simple matter. It takes a minimum of three people to tango: a seller, who has a house and wants money for it, a buyer who has money but no house, and finally, a notaire. Who usually has both, but would like to have more. (It also takes a fair amount of time and patience, but that's another matter.)

As a general rule the notaire enjoys about the same popularity as a six-months dead otter: this is not entirely fair because although it is true that their fees are eye-watering, what is called "les frais du notaire" - which come to about 8% of the purchase price - is a sum which is in fact handed over to the state, as the equivalent of stamp duty. Apart from the fees, the bloke (for most are, in fact, blokes) makes his money from parking this cash in a well-remunerated bank account for six months or so before handing it over to the Tresor Public.

Back in the day, should you be interested, unkinder tongues than mine were wont to comment on the notoriously weak bladders of provincial notaires, for the simple reason that when the deal was signed for a given - admittedly extremely low, but never outrageously so - amount, the notaire in question would feel obliged, by professional ethics (or déontologie, should you be French) to leave the room and go to the toilet whilst an undeclared wad of greasy banknotes changed hands, with a few possibly falling onto his desk.

Whatever, in principle the notaire is a totally impartial person, working only to facilitate or grease the transaction and to pocket any extra cash that might happen to come his way: in practice, this is may turn out to not be the case. Which is why my good friend and ex-spook Philippe recommends having one's own notaire in such affairs: as he said, "if they're working for the seller, they're not working for you ..." - very true, sad to say.

Take a case in point, a good friend who was taken by a house in Azillanet, put in an offer for it, and had it accepted - at 1K less than she'd she'd offered, which I suppose should really have started warning bells ringing straight away ...

Be that as it may, the procedure in France is that you first sign a "déclaration d'intention d'acheter", then - at some specified date - the "compromis de vente" (which stops people from gazumping, and is thus a Good Thing) and finally, after the statutory 10 days to repent and rethink, at some point the actual "acte de vente" is signed, at which time the place is legally yours. The exact state it is in when you get it depends on what is specified in the compromis, which is where I'm going ...

So B. put in an offer, at which point things went slowly titsup. Of course, not living here, the signature would have to be done by proxy ... no great problem. But being nobody's fool she asked to see the compromis before authorising anyone to sign, which is where things started to go bad. For starters, the signature was fixed for Widdlesday: and this on Friday. Which makes it a bit of a rush job ...

Then she read the compromis, and there were a few things therein which gave her pause. Such as, there is this thing in France whereby companies in the building trade are supposed to subscribe to a special insurance policy which guarantees their work for ten years, whether they still exist at that point or not. As it happens, any and all renovation work in this place had been done either by the owner or by a company which had not taken out this insurance, so tough titty if problems crop up.

On the other hand, despite the fact that you'd buy "as is, where is" and any hidden defects are strictly the buyer's problem, there was an out - in that the seller, having admitted to having done some of the renovation work himself, could be held, as a "vendeur professionel", personally liable. But it would be pretty cold comfort spending ten years in the French legal system, should things go titsup and if you chose to go that way. (An alternative, I suppose, would be to firebomb his house, which although satisfying is frowned upon.)

Whatever, it was at just that point that Philippe gave me the name of a friend of his who just happens to be a notaire at Gruissan, and then things started to get interesting.

For on the Monday the seller's notaire, at the request of B's notaire, sent off copies of the bills for all the work done on the place. All in all, they added up to a rather fascinating fictional oeuvre totally new to me, innocent that I am ...

They had all been established one fine day in 2016 (truth to tell I cannot speak to its actually having been a fine day as such, but it's one of them literary conventions or some-such) and paid on the nail: although surprising this is not in itself illegal.

Somewhat more surprising was the fact that a goodly amount of the work billed - and paid for - had not, to my certain knowledge, been done. This too is not illegal as such, and may indicate no more than that the buyer was a very patient person, willing to pay for work and then wait three or more years for it to be completed. I can only applaud this sort of behaviour, and wish that there were more such as he, they would make my life so much easier ...

But what was in fact illegal was that the company that had made out these bills in 2016 and, to all appearances, accepted payment, had ceased to exist in 2012. The existence of zombie companies is considered unusual, even in France - all the more so as the company, not existing, could hardly have paid the state the 10% VAT indicated.

You'd think that the seller's notaire might have done a little bit of due diligence but apparently not, it was left up to the real-estate agent to confess, when prodded with a sharp and pointy stick. These bills were totally fake, and existed purely so that when the house - a résidence sécondaire - was sold, they could be presented to the taxman to justify a mammoth reduction in the capital gains tax.

The tax department considers this to be a Bad Thing, and fiscal fraud is definitely not something I would wish to try on, for it is frowned upon. The odds of there being a contrôle may be small but the risk is there, and I personally would not care to be made an example of.

The final straw in the coffin, or nail on the camel, came with the results of the valuer's report. (I did not know this before, but there do in fact exist in France such things as chartered surveyors and property valuers. Many of them seem to be English: I assume that they cater to a small but select English clientèle who want a place in France but have no particular wish to be ripped off. Something which is difficult for the average French seller to understand.)

It was kind of damning, noting that most of the work had been done by amateurs using the cheapest possible materials and without any consideration for building standards ie "don't jump on the dining room floor, you may find yourself in the cellar". Concluding that without some major investment the place would be unsaleable.

So she walked away from it. Still looking, I hope she finds something a bit more honest.

(In an amusing twist, I heard the other day that the estate agent who tried to foist this place off is still sending her proposals. Quite shamelessly saying "I rather think that you might find this place rather interesting. Properly done up, nothing at all like that cowboy job - which I so didn't know about until you paid 1400€ to have it surveyed - in Azillanet".

And this despite having earlier said that the first seller was a personal friend and un homme très serieux ... maybe this is why estate agents are generally regarded as mouth-breathing bottom-feeders, more or less on a par with used-car salesmen and those people who ring at random hours trying to persuade you to buy double-glazing.)

In other news, I read in El Reg of a speech by "Huawei's rotating chairman Xu Zhijun". I'm pretty sure I know what they meant to say, but I'm not sure that they went about it in quite the right manner. I still have the occasional vision of an impeccably-dressed and doubtless inscrutable Chinese gentleman revolving slowly about his vertical axis, getting perhaps slightly dizzy in the process: somewhat as a sugarplum might, when dancing. (The possibility of his spinning about a horizontal axis is an amusing one to contemplate, and it would do much to enliven babyfoot games, but that way lies madness and I'll have no part of it.)

 

Mind how you go, now.