What a French buyer looks for in a listing
A French buyer first looks for whether the place has a soul, then checks that the purchase stands up. The two readings come one after the other: a listing that fails the first never reaches the second.
What they check first
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The fabric of the building, shown in detail
Parquet, floor tiles, mouldings, ceiling height, period of construction. On an older property, a listing that shows only volumes leaves them cold.
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The neighbourhood, named
Not “up-and-coming area” but the name of the neighbourhood and what is in it: the market, the station, the school. They will check the local price per square metre before calling you back.
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How secure the procedure is
Outside France this is the decisive filter. They want the equivalent of the notaire, the timescales, and who drafts what. A verbal assurance does not replace a document.
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The total cost and what comes back every year
Price, duties, fees, works, then taxes and charges. They redo the arithmetic, and an unexplained gap with the local market stops everything.
The gaps that stop them
- Photos showing volumes but no detail of the building itself.
- A neighbourhood described by adjectives rather than by its name.
- A foreign procedure explained out loud and nowhere in writing.
- A price without the costs, or annual charges left out.
- A gap with the local market that the listing does not justify.
The word to know
“Cachet” (what gives a building a soul): the word has no exact equivalent elsewhere, and it sorts properties into two piles. A property without cachet is not disqualified, but it then has to make up for it on price, location or potential, and the listing has to say so.
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