Hi there, and welcome. I have moved your query out into a thread of its own to try to attract a bit more attention - especially from someone who knows Perpignan.

It might help if we knew a little bit more about you - in particular what sort of visa you're going to be applying for. Will you be working in France? Or are you retiring to France? Joining family or friends, perhaps? How to find a place to live will depend on the level of your resources (there are limits to how much of your income you can spend on housing, for example). Why Perpignan in particular? Would you consider a small town on the outskirts of Perpignan, or do you want to live directly in the city center?

 

I'm probably 5-6 years away (at least) from moving to that general area, and very much considering Perpignan. Can't add much yet, but did find this blog Baguettes and Bicyclettes which is from someone who moved to Perpignan. Could prove helpful.

 

Good luck to you. You're probably dealing with one of the trickier parts of your adventure, trying to rent a place remotely, as an American. It's certainly doable, but finding and securing a place is not simple. If you can get assistance from someone in France, that can be worth the cost. There are individuals/firms that do this type of work, and you might want to consider checking a few out to see if they can't make your search a bit easier. Bienvenue dans le sud de la France.

 

Hi: I’m looking at moving to France. I’m not sure about renting. I’m more interested in buying, but am considering advice I received on this blog to rent for a year first.
I am a Canadian 65 in process of getting my Irish passport. Why is there an issue of renting? Do you mean finding appropriate apartment? Or actually being able to conclude a lease?
I am in correspondence with a real estate company in Occitanie and am looking at a June ‘familiarization’ trip where I’ll meet him and look at several properties in the towns I’m targeting.
Could he not steer me to rentals if that’s what I decide on?

 

Perhaps your experience will be different (helps to have language skills), but I found renting in France to be one of the most frustrating and dehumanizing experiences I have ever had. Landlords want to rent to French with salaries. Rental properties are scarce. Even with solid financials, it was very difficult to rent a place even remotely close to what we wanted and took over 2 months of diligent searching on Leboncoin. The few real estate agents I contacted for rentals either weren't terribly interested, or didn't have many properties or both.

 

I think the rental experience can vary depending upon where you are looking. We have experienced obtaining a rental in the Paris region and the SE of France. Have bought a property in two different regions - SE France and now SW France. Both rental experiences were some of the most frustrating things we have ever done .. And we've done a few doosies. In larger cities, from our experience (and multiple agencies told us matter of factly to our face) real estate agencies will not touch a foreigner that is not employed in France. It doesn't matter how many hundreds of thousands (or more) of cash you can prove you have in the bank. We had enough money in our FRENCH bank to buy the properties we were attempting to rent (and more in foreign bank accounts), but that didn't matter. We didn't have a guarantor and all the agencies required GLI acceptance (La Garantie Loyer Impayé (GLI) : qui est concerné en 2023 ?). Typically agencies will have a long list of applicants for the properties they have and they will just choose the cream of the crop; the one that ticks all their boxes. It can be quite frustrating.

I'm not saying it is impossible, just not easy. In the Paris region, we ended up renting directly through an owner who spoke perfect English, so could fully understand all our bank asset paperwork and didn't require GLI. There are numerous online platforms designed to allow owners and tenants to connect with each other. Many charge a marginal fee to join and see the properties available. That is how we found the direct to owner property in Paris.

The second rental in the SE of France was a slightly similar situation. We found it through a small agency that handled nothing but rentals. The owner of the property also had a pretty good command of English and also could understand the dossier regarding our assets and of course our on time payments every month for the rental in Paris. So, we got lucky there. But, it took us months in both regions to actually secure a rental.

If renting, I recommend you do a lot of homework as there are a LOT of rules and regulations on rentals in France. Lots of rules to protect both sides of the contract. Lots of different contracts used. Some are much more detailed than others. Read up on the rental laws. There are plenty of websites with the data available. Be sure they are current as things can change annually.

 

Renting can be a real headache for newly arrived foreigners. Part of it is that there is no centralized "credit rating service" like you have in North America, so the agencies and the landlords tend to use the "classic" criteria, which includes three months of pay slips.

You may want to take a look at the information available about renting on the PAP (Particuliers à particuliers) website. https://www.pap.fr (They also have a very informative section on buying property there.) PAP is the big resource for buyers, sellers and renters and landlords looking to "avoid the middle man" of agents and agencies. Since you already have good French, this could be a good alternative for you.

The rental market in France can be very tight - and most landlords with decent properties have multiple dossiers they can choose from (so they tend to jump at the "easiest" potential renter). It's also the case that many rental properties that are turning over won't be available to be seen more than about a month before the turnover date - and in some areas a "nice" place will be snapped up within the first few days on the market.

OTOH, if you buy right away, you may find the "gotchas" about the area in which you decide to buy - and homes do not turn over as quickly or easily here as they do in North America. It can take a year or more of renting to get to know the various districts and areas in the town or towns you think you are interested in.

 

Renting can be a real headache for newly arrived foreigners. Part of it is that there is no centralized "credit rating service" like you have in North America, so the agencies and the landlords tend to use the "classic" criteria, which includes three months of pay slips.

You may want to take a look at the information available about renting on the PAP (Particuliers à particuliers) website. https://www.pap.fr (They also have a very informative section on buying property there.) PAP is the big resource for buyers, sellers and renters and landlords looking to "avoid the middle man" of agents and agencies. Since you already have good French, this could be a good alternative for you.

The rental market in France can be very tight - and most landlords with decent properties have multiple dossiers they can choose from (so they tend to jump at the "easiest" potential renter). It's also the case that many rental properties that are turning over won't be available to be seen more than about a month before the turnover date - and in some areas a "nice" place will be snapped up within the first few days on the market.

OTOH, if you buy right away, you may find the "gotchas" about the area in which you decide to buy - and homes do not turn over as quickly or easily here as they do in North America. It can take a year or more of renting to get to know the various districts and areas in the town or towns you think you are interested in.

Bev:
Thank you!
I was going to buy, but the more research I did on my shortlisted locations, the more I felt I wanted to take my time and look at the options from THAT aside of the Atlantic. I know some houses take a long time to sell. The impetus for this move was germinated by returning again and again to a website with a little house in the French Riviera that was on the market for 3 years! So I don’t want to make a big mistake and be unhappy. I’m going to start my due diligence on renting now.

What about paying 3 or 6 months rent in advance?

I also read about a woman who contacted Airbnb renters and suggested a long term rental (probably that worked because of Covid).
I still have a lot of work to do.

So pleased with the thoughtful responses on this site!

 

We recently (late last year) rented not so far from Perpignan, in a smaller town. What was useful was advance preparation of the rental file here:

DossierFacile, le dossier de location numérique de l’État

Avec DossierFacile, créez un dossier de location en ligne complet et vérifié par l'Etat pour trouver votre appartement ou votre logement

www.dossierfacile.fr

The place we found was a new renovation and after we looked at the place I texted the owner the link for our complete Dossier which included a guarantor. She reviewed it on the spot and sent a lease to sign the next day.
I doubt you will find any 3-month rentals since that is considered to be in the holiday rental category. But if you don't mind paying much more you can do an Airbnb-type rental for the first couple of months. If you do, be aware that they frequently may want to tack on extra for electricity, which can be expensive
Had no luck with rental agencies for the reasons you mentioned, and also because the supply of rental flats is generally minimal in desirable areas.
We found ours by walking around in the Winter and looking for the "A Louer' signs. Many owners prefer not to use agencies for rentals if possible for cost reasons. Estate Agents that handle sales rarely want to deal with rentals.

We're now buying a village house nearby and will keep the flat until we close on the house and do minor renovations, or maybe retain it for use by visitors. Keep in mind that long-term flat rentals may not include things like appliances. Although ours was a new renovation, there was no stove! Fortunately, it wasn't so difficult to buy and have installed under the counter.

Make sure you get a bank set up first, as it's essential for anything to do with rentals, including paying deposits, utilities, etc. Don't try for a French bank immediately, it's not really needed, and hard to qualify as an Amcit because of reporting requirements. Set up an EU online bank, such as N26, Revoult, etc. Any EU bank will work to make your payments simple with a EU IBAN.

 

Amplifying what Roger and LoriEleanor said above you will need a garant (such as Garantme or Smartgarant). I also suggest using Dossier Facile. After soliciting about 1000 landlords through Leboncoin we finally found a great landlord who didn't even insist on a garant. It really helped that he spent a year in the US and speaks pretty good English. Out of the thousand, we probably could have succeeded on about 20. I would have hated my life here in 19 of those places. Even in this one, I don't think we will stay more than a year or two.

 

I believe the legal limit is 2 months in advance. Yes, IMO, it is much more difficult to rent here than to buy. The main reason is that your choices will be severely limited. In fact, you won't have any choice at all- your landlord will, though.

 

Whether it's harder to rent or to buy can depend on your circumstances and your situation. One big thing to remember in buying is that once you make an offer on a home and it is accepted by the seller, there is going to be a wait of at least 3 months while the notaire leaps into action to manage all the paperwork and legal stuff involved. Add to that period of time how long it is going to take to find the place of your dreams, and then there is very often work to be done on the new home before you can move in. Whether it's easier or not, you need a place to live while all that stuff is working its way through the system.