Yahoo Finance ‘We bought our French dream home for £25k – it would cost £1.5m in England’
When Phil and Kirsti Coley decided to start a family, they gave up their lives in the picturesque surroundings of the Cotswolds and left the UK.
The couple decided to move to France to stand a chance of owning their own home without being saddled with a huge mortgage.
And, perhaps unlikely in the land of red tape, the move also opened the door to business opportunities made unaffordable by high business rates back home.
“Kirsti wanted to move somewhere where it was affordable to run her own business the way that she wanted to,” says Phil, 55, a marketing business owner.
“That wouldn’t have happened in the UK, because business rates and rents are too high to set up a high street shop.”
‘We rolled up our sleeves and renovated our home ourselves’
They moved to western France to get on the housing ladder without having to take on a six-figure mortgage.
“We watched a TV programme of people buying houses in France,” says Phil. “The prices seemed reasonable so we started an internet search to look for areas that matched our cash budget of £50,000.”
The agricultural region of Limousin fitted the bill. The couple, parents to Alicia, three years old, and Teddy, seven months old, hopped on the Eurostar in 2017 to find their new home. After just 10 days, a five-bedroom dilapidated house within an acre of land with a two-bedroom gite caught their eye. It had a price tag of €30,000 (£25,632).
“It needed a lot of renovation,” said Phil, “but we were prepared to roll up our sleeves and do a lot of the work ourselves.” Seven years later, he estimates an equivalent property in the Cotswolds would be worth around £1.5m.
“A typical starter family home here costs the equivalent of £70,000 to £125,000,” says Phil, who has since set up a YouTube channel, A New Life in France.
By contrast, a first-time buyer home costs on average £251,000 in the UK, according to Zoopla, while a three-bedroom semi-detached house would set you back £280,000.
‘It’s much cheaper to run a business in France than the UK’
Kirsti, 38, moved to France full-time in 2018 while Phil remained in the UK to run his business, visiting every two months. A year later, Kirsti set up a shop in the middle of town specialising in upcycling furniture and selling chalk paint.
Phil permanently joined Kirsti in March 2020 and set up another marketing business in France, plus a co-working space.
“The barriers to starting your own retail business with high street frontage in France compared to the UK are hugely different,” he says.
“In the UK I could expect to pay between £15,000 to £20,000 in rates a year for this type of premises which we’ve turned into office and workshop space with a coffee shop. Here, it’s just £1,000 a year.”
He adds: “The business costs associated with bricks and mortar are so much lower which means the cost of the barriers to entry of starting a business aren’t the same. Like residential property, commercial property is hugely cheaper which makes it that much cheaper to run a business in France compared to the UK.
“If we had bought the same property in Cheltenham on the high street we would have paid £600,000 to £700,000 for a comparable building. We bought a former dental practice on the high street for under £50,000 that we let out for workshop space, office space and a café. I have my own office space here which I don’t have to pay for because I own it. That’s a huge benefit over the UK.
“Around 60pc of the working population in France are employed by the government, there’s not that many entrepreneurs in France, it’s a real cultural shift. It means there’s less competition from other entrepreneurs for premises and business.”
‘The tax system is more straightforward for smaller businesses’
Phil must submit a quarterly tax return, similar to the UK’s self-assessment system, to the French government. He still runs his UK business, paying corporation tax in the UK. He also submits an annual return in France for additional income earned, which includes dividends he draws from the UK company and rent he earns from commercial premises that he lets out locally.
He adds: “For self-employed and smaller businesses, [the tax system] is a lot more straightforward. My wife, for example, is classed as an artisan because she works with her hands. Because of that she pays a flat rate of tax on her turnover which is a lot simpler than the UK.”
Sam Ross, of HR platform Remote, says: “When relocating their business overseas, entrepreneurs often fail to recognise the myriad of differences in corporate laws between countries. Differences span everything from tax and how you issue shares in your company to how you employ people in your chosen jurisdiction.
“It’s not as simple as just pitching up in a new country and declaring your company open for business.”
Ross says it is important to get on top of local differences by consulting with local legal experts.
“In-country legal experience is crucial when navigating the complexities of corporate and employment law. It’s worth taking advice before running the risk of slipping into non-compliance.”
‘The UK’s love of red tape is tame compared to France’
“There’s so many upsides to living here,” says Phil. “There’s definitely much more of a sense of community in France than in the UK. From our perspective, France is like the UK was 20 or 30 years ago.”
But there is a catch, he adds. “The French are renowned for their paperwork, that’s the downside of living here. The UK’s love of red tape is tame compared to France. Everything is completed in duplicate and triplicate.”
Successive governments have put in place policies to improve the landscape for the 2.5 million-plus entrepreneurs and single business owners, says Marguerite Monrose, also of Remote.
“If you fall into this category, my biggest tip would be to explore and exploit the long list of government subsidies available for French small businesses, particularly the exemption for very small businesses from national insurance contributions.”
Having moved before the UK left the European Union, they faced no complicated visa process. British citizens who moved to a EU country before the end of the Brexit transition period on December 31, 2020, are typically allowed to continue living there without a visa under the Withdrawal Agreement.
They must still apply for a new residence status, which varies by country, but generally includes the right to work, study, and access public services.
Karoli Hindriks, of employee relocation platform Jobbatical says: “Since Brexit, moving to Europe as a Brit has become more difficult. Rules vary considerably from country to country, but we are seeing some promising innovations such as the popular digital nomad visa which has been adopted by over 50 countries.”
