Our 3rd stop was with our English friends Sam & Bishop who had made the brave decision to sell their business and house in the UK and move to the Dordogne in the south-west of France. Tim & Dawn came down for Easter as well and there was plenty of Champagne going around.
We liked the area very much as well and wouldn’t mind having a small place there as well. But instead of buying an old house which had to be renovated we wanted a plot of land to build our own place on. Sam arranged for an appointment with a real estate agent (luckily she was English) and we spent a day looking at different plots of land. The last one we visited was the nicest; rectangular, off a very quiet small road and just over 6000 square meters in size. Want to see the video of the land?
The next 2 days we spent negotiating the price and finally we got an agreement. We found out there was no CU (certification d’urbanisation) on the land, so it wasn’t building land as advertised. Getting a CU shouldn’t be a problem as there was an almost new house next to our plot. We agreed that not getting the CU would make the Contract void.
A couple of weeks later we received the Contract and had it proof read by Cathy. All was in order so we paid the 10% down payment to the notaire.
In July we finally received word that the CU had been denied. Apparently the water board did not want to extend the water mains… Something smelled fishy, but what can you do…
It is now September and we hope to get our deposit back this month. But, we will go back and have look at some other plots.
To be continued….