Do They All Require An Address?

[someday81]

Hey folks. Well it looks like I'll be off to France in January. I'll be studying French while I am there. What else I'll be doing? Who knows. Living life I guess. My question is this though. Seeing how horrible the dollar has be doing against the Euro, I'm trying to find a way to preserve as much of my money's value as possible, but it appears as if in France you need a French address before you can open up a French account. I was just curious, what did you non EU members do as far as opening up a bank account before you moved, and does anyone know of a way to preserve as much of my money's value (legally) before I leave short of just coverting to Euro's and keeping the money under my mattress, or should I possibly do that? Thanks in advance.

Branden

[Bevdeforges]

Most expats in my circle seem to have opened their French account after they got here.

I know my strategy has always been to convert money as little as possible. I keep a couple of foreign accounts open and pay bills in dollars from my US account, bills in pounds from my UK account and local bills from the French account.

The other strategy is to transfer funds infrequently and in large amounts from one bank to the other. Takes the hit all in one bite and it's normally a better deal than transferring small amounts or getting hit with the minimum exchange fee on credit card purchases.
Cheers,
Bev