Feels kinda surreal to be writing this blog post. To be sharing this crazy dream of mine come true. I want to start this post with something I said on IG stories the other day… and that’s that I am of course so excited to share that we purchased the cutest little home away from home in France but even much moreso that I feel like it’s my encouragement telling you to go for your dreams. Those “wild, crazy, you feel all alone in what you’re dreaming” kind of daydreams. Whatever in the world they may be. Because it isn’t that I am sharing we spent millions of dollars on some crazy chateau. In fact, logistics aside of owning a home overseas and always having that extra factor of “getting there”… we spent less than any lakefront home or beach house we could’ve gotten around here if vacation home was next on your investment list. It’s that it’s my own personal dream come true. A dream I have felt ridiculous for even saying out loud over the years. A dream I felt would never actually fall into place. That the stars of… finding a city I adored enough to live in for weeks and eventually months at a time, a home I loved and could afford, a partner who supported and encouraged me in doing so and just a personal/work life that would be able to overall mold around it all…. would never actually all align.
I can honestly say that I have genuinely grown to LOVE sharing encouragement through my own life’s highs and lows. I love sharing that your dreams are worth pursuing, that just as my own life turned right around… your own situation can change in an instant and that most of all, whether it’s surviving a life storm or pursuing your biggest dreams… it’s all about focusing on, living in and celebrating the baby steps it takes to make it through. And that is ALWAYS the point in what I share. My dreams may be none of yours and your situation is likely completely different than my own, but it’s the overall push to keep dreaming and keep pursuing. Put on those headphones to all the chatter about what you should and shouldn’t daydream about or work toward and march on forward. It is your life you are living RIGHT?!? 😉
For me the baby steps began so long ago now that I cannot even pinpoint a decade. One day I just started to daydream about living abroad. There’s just something about the slower, more intentional way of life in some areas of Europe that I truly just adore. Don’t get me wrong, I LOVE the U.S. and would never move overseas full time for lots of reasons but the idea of having a place to soak it all in for longer periods of time was just something I couldn’t stop daydreaming about. My daydreaming then turned to this idea I had back in 2016 to take 5-6 weeks each Summer and adventure Europe with my girls. I got to work mentally plotting and planning how in the world I could work to make it all happen to get away each Summer… between affording it all to literally just being able to get away for so long. Quite literally what motivated me to grow AW in those early days even when I didn’t at the time “have to work”.
I had sooooo many questions about this purchase on my IG story questionnaire so I am going to try my best to at some point in this post run through them all. First… why France and do I speak French? For reasons I cannot even remember anymore, I started taking French in 9th grade and immediately fell in love with the language. I continued studying all through high school and then all five years of college. I graduated college feeling rather fluent-ish but then almost twenty years went by with very few opportunities to practice so I’ve forgotten a good bit unfortunately. I can definitely communicate no problem and hold a small conversation with the locals but studying once again is definitely now back on the agenda! They’re always so sweet about helping me and I feel like they just appreciate the effort. P.S. I do NOT think speaking French is necessary at all to travel there unless you are going to the smallest, non-touristy villages and then that’s still a… you will probably be fine.
As far as why France and Antibes in particular… I think my love for the language kind of started it all and then after college, I was just dying to visit. I traveled to France for the first time in 2007 and have since been a good many times. After visiting quite a few countries in Europe and a lot of cities in France, it took one visit to Antibes and I just fell in love. I knew I didn’t like the big city vibe for more than a few days but then we also found ourselves bored after a few days in the cutesy, village towns each Summer where there isn’t as much to do. Antibes (Old Town) just felt like the perfect mix of it all. It’s touristy enough to have tons of amazing restaurants and fun shopping but not even remotely big city crazy like Paris. Most all of the streets in Old Town are car-free and there are what feels like hundreds of stunningly beautiful streets oozing with charm to meander all filled with flowering vines, colorful shutters and gorgeous terra cotta roofs. Old Town is also situated right on the Mediterranean Sea and in my opinion, it’s on one of the prettiest stretches of beach and ocean in the French Riviera. Especially if you ride the little town train to Juan les Pins! The city is also super clean and well-kept with more and more beautifully done and intentionally designed buildings being built around Old Town that feel like a natural extension of the city. Although the overall “commute” to France is no joke, it is fairly easy to get to with a 20 minute Uber ride from the Nice, France airport. Oh and the MARKETS! I have seen the Antibes markets on so many “Best of Europe” travel posts. Their daily fruit/veggie/meat/cheese market is UNBELIEVABLE. And honestly one of the best selling points for us… THE WEATHER!!! It has a very California weather vibe with ever so slightly warmer Summers and cooler Winters but nothing like Georgia! I have lots more I could rave about with Antibes but I won’t bore you with anymore for now ;)… until my Antibes Travel Guide!
So… Antibes it was and then came the… is this REALLY what WE want… FOREVER?!? I remember when John and I first started dating. I didn’t really ever watch TV so we would sit and listen to music and talk for HOURS. I think he was probably half intrigued and half terrified of all of my big dreams and crazy ideas… including this one. Obviously with any committed relationship comes a lot of compromise and things/dreams/ways that shift and mold into this new life that you are creating together… but then there’s also the “little” things in the back of your mind you consider kind of a non-negotiable, especially the older you get. For me, finding someone not only willing but that also genuinely enjoyed traveling was kind of high on the list for me BUT finding someone who was also wanting/willing to purchase a home overseas with me I knew would DEFINITELY fall more into the mold/shift/compromise “department”… on my end!
John thankfully loves to travel right up there with as much as I do. Which I LOVE! I remember one night he chatted forever about his travels to Italy and how much he loved Tuscany. Plus, he is Italian so there’s that! He also has a deeper appreciation for architecture and intentionality in life and design more than any man I’ve ever met. He’s the guy that will stand and read every plaque in a museum and will stop and look at every method of masonry, landscaping and architectural detail as we walk the streets. Having said all of that though, it still did not necessarily mean he’d share my passion for owning a home abroad. I definitely think (well I know because we’ve chatted about it in much detail) that he was very 50/50 about it all until he actually visited Antibes. He always said I know this is your dream and I always want you to be able to make your dreams come true but I also genuinely wanted him to WANT the same as well… which I reminded him at least a few hundred times… including the entire day before we signed the papers! Along with a reminder that I would also genuinely be 1,000% okay with us deciding to do something otherwise.
Sorry y’all trying to answer ALL the questions without being too chatty is feeling kind of impossible. LOL! Last Summer Antibes was our second to last stop on our Summer travels. It was John’s first visit and my fourth. He knew at that point that Antibes is where I kind of had my heart set on looking if we were to ever purchase something abroad. And thankfully he absolutely loved it. He was always super honest about it all and after our time there he said… I am all in… let’s do it. On a few conditions that we both felt together…
Someone asked… did it check all of your boxes? Coming into this Summer and having found an agent which I will chat more about and having our funds all situated, we said we will only of course move forward if we find something that feels “perfect” for us. There was no rush even to the point that if it never felt right, we’d never jump. Which if you read my IG story the night before we went and looked, I was 100% certain this would not be the year. Things sell so fast that we were down to three properties to see and it just felt impossible that one of the three would check all of our boxes. We’d even told our agent that if he could just kind of see what we liked we’d be willing to quickly fly back another time if more came on the market later this year or next or whenever.
French Riviera real estate as it probably already sounds is CRAZY expensive. Real estate I feel like STARTS at 1,000 Euros per square foot. However, we knew that going into it and felt this area was absolutely worth it… even living in Old Town which is pricier too… and that our purpose in “living there” is truly a simpler life. More time outdoors and adventuring around. Windows open, fresh market dinners and less chores and responsibility. So going in, we were prepared for our European dream to be tiny BUT we agreed that we’d have to find a place that even small, felt big enough. As in lots of natural light, high ceilings, a separate sleeping area (not a loft style) and just the feeling that we aren’t living in a closet. LOL! Because as we knew in staying in lots of Airbnbs over the years, small spaces can feel vastly different depending on different factors.
I am jumping around a bit but trying to be open and honest and answer everything while also explaining our choice. Our second, but I guess really our #1 MUST, is that it had to fall within our budget. I had sooooo many questions asking how much we paid and how loans work overseas. I always try to be thorough and answer things honestly so… we paid cash for our place so unfortunately I am not sure how a foreign loan works BUT I do have an idea for those considering a purchase and wanting a loan (keep reading until the end)… I will say first that when I had inquired a few years back locally, our bank and mortgage agent at the time wasn’t able to assist in a foreign transaction. I also had someone message and say they’d looked into it and it was 50-60% down. Once again though, I am not sure. I had made a goal a few years ago that if it ever did actually all work out, that I really wanted to pay cash so that’s something I have been working hard toward. As far as an idea for those thinking/dreaming about doing this but would need a loan (this is going somewhere I promise!)… back in 2019, I paid off everything I own and became completely debt free. I feel like that has been huge for me in starting to grow my business more and invest in other things. I am pretty much a… if I can’t pay cash for it I don’t need/want it kind of person (obviously not starting out but over time) so I feel like paying off my home was a huge step for me to get the ball rolling in further saving/investing. BUT one idea is if you have your home paid off, you can mortgage a portion of your home back out to purchase something else. I actually did this to pay part of our two local historic flip homes so I wouldn’t have to touch my savings or my “France home fund”. I took out maybe 1/4 or 1/5 of what our home is worth so I could fund myself on flipping those homes without feeling like I was touching my safety net or my dream fund. If that makes sense. Just an idea and a way to get a loan without having to fool with a foreign one.
Although it was VERY tempting to get a loan and be able to expand our budget and purchase something a little bigger, another promise we made was that we’d stick to our cash budget and if we found something we found something and if we didn’t, we didn’t! Our budget going in was $400,000 TOTAL. Including a 7.5% notary fee that is standard in France on EVERY transaction and the dollar to Euro conversion which also adds a good bit back into the total. Once all is said and done will be spending about $375,000 on our new place. All fees and conversions included. Which is amazing in my opinion for my dream place! It may be small but it’s truly everything we need and really wanted.
One really important box this home checked that is also something to REALLY keep in mind with purchasing overseas is that our “apartment” has has a solid “foundation” (structurally and mechanically). We have close couple friends from France and we’d chatted with them a good bit about our purchase over the last year or so and one thing he said to keep in mind is that fixer uppers here and fixer uppers there can be two different beasts. For a number of reasons. One, old here is maybe a few decades. Old there could be quite a few centuries! An amazing deal on what looks like a gem could mean a home that hasn’t seen an update since electricity. He joked that a renovation on those kinds of gems could be the kind that lasts the rest of your life! So although we were definitely up for a good many cosmetic projects, having a solid… updated to at least this century… “foundation” (structurally and mechanically) was a MUST! And one more important thing to note… in our case (and in all of Antibes) and I am sure many cities like this where buildings are split between owners, we are responsible for the exterior based on the percentage we own of the entire interior. Meaning that if we own 25% of the interior, we are responsible for 25% of the cost of any exterior maintenance or updates.
To say that the “solid foundation” box was checked for our new place is an understatement thankfully! It was really really checked off! Like with a Sharpie. LOL! Our three story 17th century building was purchased and is currently under complete renovation by an amazing renovation company local to Antibes. It’s a father/son company that has done incredible work with quite a few complete projects in Antibes that had been in almost ruins. We toured several of their renovated buildings and they were all beautifully done! They not only pretty much gutted-ish the inside but they also updated the mechanicals all the way from the street including the common spaces all while keeping the charm and history of the building. They also even repaired/replaced the 200 year old terra cotta roof! All renovations in the building including our apartment will be completed late September to early October.
So here are the details of our new home… our apartment is located in the Old Town of Antibes, France in a building they think dates back to the 17th century. It’s a three story building with a cute little bakery on the bottom floor and five total apartments. It’s located in the most perfect location, in our opinion right in Old Town just a literal stone’s throw from the beautiful main square and the little town train that goes to the beach. It has a terra cotta roof and the quintessential French blue shutters. Our apartment is around 350 square feet with one bedroom, a living area, kitchen/breakfast area and one bathroom. Although we definitely hoped to find a two bedroom, it surprisingly wasn’t a must for us. We actually did look at one in our price range but we liked the finishes and the location of this one much better. And yes, we have four kids but this is more of a long term lifestyle for us which will mostly be the two of us. Plus, with three teens in the mix, they already don’t want to share rooms so that would mean we’d need like a five bedroom and that would be well… that million dollar chateau I mentioned we WERE NOT getting. LOL! We plan to make the living area cozy and sleep-able for two more when needed which will be perfect for us and Winnie when we go as a family. It’s actually an almost identical size and layout to the Paris Airbnb we rented back in 2018 if you’ve been following me for that long which was plenty big for the four of us. When we do all go, we just plan to rent another place for our three teens whenever they can join which has already become way fewer and farther between.
Entry…
Living Room…
Bedroom…
Kitchen…
Bathroom…
Someone asked if I was sad that it was fully updated and “modern”. Honestly, not at all and it kind of worked out to be a huge blessing. We are so drawn to things that need work but what we really needed and (got) was something that we COULD work on but didn’t HAVE to. We plan to change and add lots and lots over time but for now, it’ll be nice to have something move-in ready. Plus, they did such a great job with the stonework and beams that it feels old and our front doors are old and beautiful!
Now let’s chat logistics and specifics! I can honestly say that although yes, we did not get a loan which adds a difficulty factor in itself, the process has been sooooooo easy!
First things first, how did I start my research and find our agent… It was kind of a slow crawl over the years to be honest. Of kind of researching here and there as the idea seemed more and more plausible. I first joined a few random France (expat, real estate, etc…) boards on Facebook… which can be very informative in a number of ways FYI… and then started posting questions about various things related to purchasing. I also of course did lots of Google searches and chatting with our friends from France. To be honest, I am pretty quick to make decisions and don’t usually dwell or stress about things too much. I guess that can go both ways… good and bad! I can’t say I researched the heck out of everything but I felt we knew enough going in. Since we are paying cash we did not need a French bank account for the purchase (but you would if you are) however, we will be getting one once we start renting it out. As far as our agent, I found him by simply posting on a France Expat board I am a member of asking for recommendations. He’s from England which was a huge help in terms of language! Although everyone for the most part really does speak amazing English.
Things to note when purchasing a home in France… as I mentioned above, two important things to note if you are trying to calculate costs. First, in France there is a “French Notaire’s Fee” with every real estate transaction. It is 7-8% with older properties and ours came out to about 7.5%. And this applies no matter how you are paying for the property… cash or loan! There is also of course the monetary conversion to keep in mind. On the recommendation of our agent, we are using Currency Direct to handle our exchange. We have money wired from our bank to our new Currency Direct account and then they disperse money as needed. You can also lock in rates as the exchange rate fluctuates and you then have a certain amount of time to transfer funds out. We had to immediately transfer for our down payment of 10% but we may lock in a rate soon for the remaining balance we will need for the final closing. Also, something else to keep in mind is that it takes around three months to close on a property in France. Once again, doesn’t matter if you’re paying cash or getting a loan, it’s a lengthy process that can even take as long as four months. They guesstimated ours at three months but it may be ever so slightly sooner since other newly renovated properties in our building have sold. And finally, one more thing different in France than the U.S. is that there is a 5-10% deposit required to have a home under contract. This is due once the purchase agreement has been signed and the ten day cooling off period has expired. Ours was 10% down and I am honestly not sure how that percentage is determined.
Renting, staying and visas… first off, YES! We will be renting our apartment on Airbnb. We aren’t in any rush so I am not sure exactly when it’ll be plus we have to finalize our property management company choice (we got info on them during our visit) BUT when it’s ready, y’all will be the first to know! How often will we be there? As often as we can! Which honestly won’t be too too much during the first few years. We plan to make it our “home base” for our six week Summer adventures from here on out with plane/train trips to other places in Europe here and there during our stay. Plus, we would definitely like to go at least another week or two a year at some point most likely during Holiday when our exes have the kiddos… Thanksgiving, Spring Break, etc. Once the kiddos are grown, we do hope to spend maybe 1/4-1/3 of our time there each year if not more. We shall see! Do we have to get a Visa or Citizenship? Nope! U.S. citizens with passports for tourism can stay for a period of 90 days within each six-month period. Beyond that, there is a long-stay visa and an investor visa that may be options for us in the future.
Whew, I hope that answers all of your questions but feel free to leave more below and THANK Y’ALL SO MUCH as always for all of the love, support and encouragement. Means more than you know! XOXO, Brittany Palazzo
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