Will it or won’t it affect house sales in France we all asked, and we’re talking of Brexit of course. We’ve seen the exchange rate of sterling versus euros go up and down and generally stabilise. We’ve had pundits and experts give an opinion but the reality is that if anything, Brexit has actually increased the interest of Brits to buy in France.
According to the latest statistics released by Leggett Immobilier, Brexit doesn’t appear to have had a negative impact on the demand for French property by English buyers.
“Evidence is very much to the contrary,” says Leggett chairman, Trevor Leggett. “Enquiries are up 34 percent over the past three months from people in the UK seeking to buy property in France when compared to the same period 12 months ago. At the same time we’re noting increasing demand from ‘serious’ buyers – that is those people who have thought carefully about their decision before deciding to buy a home in France.”
Mr Leggett said total sales levels had also not dipped post Brexit: “they are in fact unchanged from this time last year and prices are holding steady! Interestingly, we’ve witnessed increasing demand from French buyers over the same period,” he said. “This would indicate a strengthening market which appears at last to have ‘bottomed out’.”
Property buyers Tony and Sharon Benton who have just purchased a house in the beautiful Dordogne area say “we did worry about it but when thought it through it seemed daft to not do something we’ve been dreaming of for so long”. They’d been looking for the right property for almost six months before Brexit and found it shortly after the vote went through. “We discussed it endlessly, do we go ahead or not but in the end we decided not to destroy our dream. After all, when we weren’t in the EU Brits were still buying property here. We couldn’t be happier with our decision. We’re planning to retire in a year or so and we can’t wait to live the good life in France!”.
Leggett Immobilier is the largest English real estate company in France. It has been voted Best Estate Agency in France in the International Property Awards for the last four years running.
