If you are thinking about spending several months in this area of France, then this page is for you! Outside the peak summer holiday season we are able to offer our furnished gites at a much lower monthly rate for a longer term contract.

Why stay with us?

We offer high-quality accommodation that is appropriate for use all year round. All our gites were built to be used as houses, so they are properly equipped for family life - we did not want gites that were practical only for use during a summer holiday eating salads 'al-fresco'. Our gites stay practical once the weather gets colder and the family needs to live inside together daily 'at home'. They have a full-size fridge and freezer, electric cooker, microwave, four-ring hob, dishwasher, washing machine and keen cooks will find all the kitchen utensils they need! The gites are heated, insulated and self-contained.

We have lived in France for over 20 years, are fluent in French and have helped many families over the transition of moving to a new area, a new country, a new environment. Everybody has different questions, concerns or needs; but whether it is opening a bank account in France, translating a notaires document or finding a vet - we've seen most things before and we live on site so we're around if you need us!

When can I rent long-term?

Our long term lets run from the start of October through to the end of May. It is possible that we may be able to extend these bookings back into September or on into June, subject to the availability of each gite.

Costs

Costs are quoted per calendar month, e.g. a month from 10th November to 9th December. Please contact us with details of your requirements and we will send you a reply with a price based on length of stay, size of gite and time of year. Generally, the longer the length of stay the better the rate we are able to offer.

Please remember: The prices listed on our prices page are our WEEKLY rates for short term holidays, these bear no resemblance to our long term rates and there's no point in us putting our long term rates on this site as the two sets of rates just confuse everybody - please write to ask!

Long term rentals differ from holiday rentals in that the rates are lower and breakage deposit and utilities are handled differently.

• The breakage deposit is the equivalent of one months rental charge.
• We pay for the water that you use.
• We pay your French property taxes (Taxe Fonciere and Taxe d'Habitation).
• All gites have Wi-fi or LAN connected fibre broadband.
• We pay the French TV licence and all gites have French digital TNT TV.
• We can no longer receive UK satellite TV, but if you use a VPN and have the necessary accounts you can watch it through the internet.
• The electricity charge is calculated simply from the number of units of electricity used, multiplied by the cost charged by the French electricity board (EDF). We will read your meter with you on a monthly basis and ask for payment within the following 15 days.
• If you are in gite Bordeaux, the central heating gas charge is calculated simply from the amount of gas used from the tank (read to the nearest 1%) multiplied by the refill cost charged by the gas company.
• For all gites, the hob gas is provided by a 13kg butane bottle. We supply a new full bottle when you arrive and charge you the cost price, each bottle then lasts about four months so the cost is low.
• French law requires a more formal 'contrat de location' which replaces our usual booking form. Although the formal version must be in French, we provide a English translation.

Other important things to mention

This page is the ONLY page on this website that describes the facilities available during long term lets. The rest of our website is aimed at our short-term holiday business and most of the things written there probably won't apply to a long term let. For example:

Some of the tourist attractions in the area (water sports, open air music, evening foodmarkets) close down outside the main holiday months, but others (climbing parks, golf, fishing, horseriding, road cycling, rock climbing and so on) do stay open for most of the year.

Long term lets exclude the use of the onsite summer facilities such as the pool, sunbeds, table tennis and other games unless specifically added to the contract.

Long term lets exclude all linen. This means that you will need to bring duvets, duvet covers, sheets, pillows, pillowcases, towels, drying-up towels and any other household linen that you use.

For purely practical reasons, things that we provide for summer holidaymakers are not possible out of season. An example would be the outdoor furniture - steel chairs and marble tables are fine in the summer when it is hot and sunny, but suffer very quickly through the winter so for long term lets we usually provide upvc tables and chairs that can happily cope with rain, snow and wind if they happen to arrive!

Although the gites are fully furnished you are welcome to add your own furniture to them or to use your own furniture instead of ours (e.g TVs, tables or beds). We can also usually arrange storage if you are emigrating to France with some items - please ask.

Why rent long-term?

Our long-term clients have stayed with us for several reasons, but the most common are:

• Considering a move to France and wanting to experience the area off-season and for longer than a holiday.
• Already committed to moving to this area and wanting a base for searching for a house or overseeing building work or completing the purchase.
• Exploring "Working from home' for a few months in a much nicer environment - we have had people working from here and if it's necessary to fly back to the office there are reliable flights from Toulouse and Carcassonne to most of Europe.
• Simply wanting to get away from "city life" or the "dark of winter" or "the same four walls" for a few months!
• Relocating to the area for a fixed-length business project (more usually French families).
• 'Time out' or a sabbatical from work.
• An inspirational location for creative work or book writing.