KEY POINTS:
Have you ever coveted your elderly neighbour's rooftop apartment? Or felt the desire to take over her seafront villa before it falls into ruin? Under a medieval French system known as a viager, you can end up owning either for a fraction of their value.
Buying a property en viager involves making a one-off payment (poetically called a bouquet) and then paying "rent" to the occupant until they die. Never mind taxes or wills: when the owner finally dies, the property is yours.
It may sound a little macabre but the scheme has started to gain popularity in France and, with more and more elderly homeowners wanting to release some equity from their homes, the viager arrangement seems to make sense for buyers and sellers.
Last year there were almost 7000 viager transactions in France, up from 5000 three years ago. "People retiring earlier may want to release the assets trapped in their homes," says Alain Le Mouzy-Costes, founder of Renee Costes Viager, a Parisian agency specialising in such transactions. "Most of our viager clients have no children to leave their property to and pensions are increasingly inadequate."
Elderly property owners - known rather morbidly as tetes (heads) in the world of the viager - typically advertise their property with details of their ages, the bouquet, the rent (which is nearly always index-linked) and whether the property is occupied or free. It can read a bit like an epitaph but it's all part of a complex equation calculated by the local notary.
It can sound like a great deal for the investor but the viager is definitely a big gamble, because France has one of the world's longest life expectancies. According to the French statistics agency Insee, for every 100,000 people born in France, more than half will live to at least 84.
Choose the wrong couple and getting your hands on the property could be a long wait.
In 1965, a sprightly 47-year-old notary, Francois Raffray, signed a viager agreement to acquire an apartment in the centre of Arles. The owner was 90-year-old Jeanne Calment, who smoked, enjoyed the odd glass of wine and was reportedly quite partial to a brandy and ginger ale. What Raffray didn't know was that she also rode a bicycle, roller-skated and had recently taken up fencing.
Thirty years later, the unfortunate Raffray died, leaving his widow to continue making payments to Madame Calment, who was by then more than 120 years old. She lived for another two years, by which time she had moved to a nursing home, become the oldest person ever and certainly the oldest person to have had their rent paid in perpetuity. A heroine to French pensioners, there's now an old people's home named after her in Arles.
Viagers have to live for at least 20 days after they sign the annuity documents at the notary's office. Even tied up with legal minutiae, there's certainly something quite Kind Hearts and Coronets about the arrangement.
After all, apparently healthy elderly people can sometimes pass away unexpectedly, especially if they have someone waiting to move into their swanky apartment.
"Non, non, non!" says Le Mouzy-Costes. "After 10 years in the business, I've never heard of anything untoward going on."
Currently on the viager market is a huge, 320sq m villa in the Limousin region with double garage, wine cellar, granite fireplace and separate apartment for a bouquet of €250,000 ($460,000) plus a monthly rent of €1000. The owner is 84.
In Saint Raphael on the western Riviera, a 34sq m studio with a seaview terrace is going for €30,000 plus €700 monthly rent; the owner is 82. And in Paris, close to the Pompidou centre, a fifth-floor apartment is available for a one-off fee of €25,000 plus €824 monthly rent, but the lady-owner is just 66.
There is nothing to stop foreigners buying French properties en viager. "We have a lot of foreigners on our books," says Le Mouzy-Costes, "some of them buy places en viager without ever seeing them."
Ironically, the viagers, with little outlay but a vision of security, may be just the thing to help first-time buyers gain a foothold on the property ladder - though they may have to wait to move in.
- OBSERVER
