We're currently looking into some housing for a family of rabbits[1]. We're not too sure what to do, between buying (prices seem stupid at the moment) and renting (it does feel like throwing money out the window, doesn't it? Despite my own article).
I've been an avid reader of the Bulle Immobiliere forum for a while, and I am personally convinced the house market is done going up, and will most probably go back down soon.
Anyway, we visited a house to sell this saturday. Not really a house, as it's part of some kind of a complex of 3 bedroom units, which the agent proudly announces will most likely be listed soon because it's been designed by some famous architect. Listing means you'll get help from the governement for work on the outside of the building. However, it also means you need approval to do any work on the outside of the building. Approval from a French administration usually means you don't get it (not that it gets refused -- you'll just be lucky if you get the approval before your grand children die; considering that people will be living up to 160 by then, that's quite a long time.)
The place is quite nice indeed: the unit is organised around a patio, so it's sort of like having a garden, but you don't get any nosy neightbours whatsoever. It sorts of looks like a bunker from the outside, but who cares.
The most interesting thing here, I thought, was the speach of the agent: it's basically based on all the myths that are presented on the Bulle Immobiliere site:
Ah well, we're not eager to get 25 years of debt in the hope this unit will take 30% in a couple of years. Funnily enough, the agent as the cheek of saying this isn't speculation: "I'm certain it'll go up in value." Yeah right. Strangely enough, the current selling price seems to be already 12% lower than the price on the ad displayed in the agency window.
[1] I am let known that it's only two, and for the sole purpose of private nuggles.