After seeing what we nicknamed the Village House, we gave ourselves a few days to ponder if this was what we really wanted. While we looked at a couple more houses, our thoughts kept swirling around this house and the potential it held. We returned to the house a few times more, once with an architect who was miraculously available at short notice and drove 90 minutes the very next day to meet with us and go through the house, and another visit with a local builder whom we would most likely be using for the much-needed renovations. Both of these professionals gave the house a big thumbs-up and were not fazed by the amount of work it needed. We talked about building an annex on the side, adding a master bedroom, bath and closet.
As it stands now, the house has just two bedrooms and a tiny bath on the upper floor. But it has several surprises. The first is an unfinished space just off the kitchen that could become a pantry, laundry room, and/or bathroom. It’s pretty rough looking, but quite intriguing (use your imagination, with the appropriate finishing, it could be something great). From the kitchen, through that door in the back, is the space we’re calling the cave.
Another diamond-in-the-rough is the attic space. The creaky and cobwebbed stairs are in place to get up there, but it is apparent the space has never been used for anything. My thoughts immediately turned it into a beautiful guest suite, with a spacious open-beamed bedroom, bath and sitting room spanning the entire top floor:
One more great feature of the property is the numerous outbuildings. In addition to the chicken and rabbit coops (which we wouldn’t use), there are several other storage spaces. One could be expanded a little and made into a single garage, another contains a big surprise that made me squeal with delight when I saw it:
A huge old apple press! I don’t think we could use it, but it sure is great looking. There is also a nice collection of old tools.
One week after our first visit to the house, we made arrangements with the owners to meet again to discuss a offer. This time we were met by 7 of the 11 owners. We had a little speech prepared and with the helpful translation services of our friend Connie, we carefully presented our offer, assuring them that this was to be a full-time home for us, not a holiday house, and we would take good care of their family homestead. They seemed to like that, and a price was agreed upon. We shook hands all around, and that was it, the very first step of our next chapter. A few days later we went to the notaire’s office (a notaire is a real estate lawyer, and the only way you can buy a house in France) to fill out the first of the forms involved. We’re slightly terrified of what we’re getting ourselves into, but ready for the challenges and eager to get going. Wish us luck!
We’d been looking at houses for sale in the area for about a week, and figured we’d seen all the options available, at least the ones to which our real estate agent had access. We had learned that in France, there is no Multiple Listing Service, like there is in the U.S., so you are pretty much limited to whatever listings a particular real estate agency has in their control. We had seen other houses listed online, but the agents were not local companies and even when I wrote to the listing agent for more information, I received no response. I guess they aren’t that interested in selling houses. We were also confused by the fact that we had sometimes seen the same houses listed by more than one company, with different listing prices, photos and descriptions.
We were starting to wonder if we were not going to have that “This is it!” moment when walking into a house, and were beginning to re-think the houses we’d already seen in the hopes that we could find some glimmer of a gem among them. Then, our local friend, who knows a good number of the folks living in Le Grand-Pressigny, received a call from a friend of hers saying that the house next door to her was for sale by owner. We immediately went off to investigate the house.
Hmmm. It was right in the middle of the village. Check. From the outside it looked large enough to be at least 3 bedrooms and 2 baths. Check. And it definitely had charm. Check. Things were looking promising for this one. We called the owners and made an appointment to see it the next day. 
Our first glimpse of it. :::cue the goosebumps:::
This may look like an old mess to you, but I think we fell in love even before we entered that green gate. So, since it was for sale by owner, we figured we’d be meeting the owner there. It turns out there are 11 owners — the 11 siblings who grew up there. In this two bedroom house, including the parents, that would be 13 people. Wow. That first visit we met four of the 11 siblings. They don’t speak English and we don’t (yet) speak French, so we were fortunate to have our pal Connie with us to handle the translation.
What lovely people they were. They were so friendly and eager to show us their house. We were first led around the outside area. I was tickled that there were chicken and rabbit coops next to the house, a big old pump, and a large back yard.
While we were standing in the middle of the big yard behind the house, we turned and looked back toward the house. OMG, there’s the chateau right above us!
This was exciting. Now we were really eager to see the inside of the house. Let me just say that I have seen enough House Hunters International episodes to know that you have to look past many of the cosmetic things like paint colors, wallpaper and flooring, and focus on the potential, like whether it has good bones and sufficient room sizes. So, feeling prepared for anything, we stepped inside.
Here are a few pictures of the inside of the house, which has been vacant for a few years.
OK, so not the best, but certainly not bad. We could see this one had good bones, and was definitely worth considering. I think if we hadn’t already seen quite a few other houses in the area, we might not have realized the potential in this one. And this house had location, location, location going for it too. It was just a few steps from the main street with a butcher shop, town square, hotel, bakery, bar/cafe, market, post office, just about anything you would need. We were intrigued. Stay tuned for what happens next!
Before we started our search for a house in France, we determined that we had a few requirements: the house should be within the village of Le Grand-Pressigny, it should have at least three bedrooms and two baths, and it should have some character and charm. However, because we had only been inside a couple houses there before our decision to move, we told the local realtor we wanted to see every house available, regardless of location, price, or size, in order to get a better idea of what kinds of houses are in the area. We ended up seeing 13 houses that were for sale, and visited several homes of new friends there and learned that, for us, the most attractive homes were the ones that had been renovated from a barn or other old structure. We loved the beautifully restored stone houses and observed the various ways to restore the old walls.
While visiting the home of friends in town, we were so impressed with this wall. When they were removing the old plaster, they unearthed a very old method of construction, and instead of covering it up, they framed a piece with glass so you can see how it looks inside the wall. A brilliant idea, and it’s such a beautiful wall now.
Back to the house search.
We still had not found the one house that spoke to us. But, one day our realtor took us to this gorgeous house in the nearby village of Abilly (i.e. not where we wanted to be), and it was so impressive that we briefly considered throwing out all our requirements and buying it right then and there. It’s right on the River Claise, in absolutely move-in condition, with large living spaces, and even had a refrigerated wine cellar room that I had visions of enjoying when the summer temperatures became unbearable. We finally came to our senses, got over our house lust and back on track with our search.
And the search goes on.
Le Grand-Pressigny will be our new home, so we’re out and about taking in the sights while learning more about our new country.
I’m learning about France’s various departments, communes, hamlets, villages and such, so you can learn along with me. Continental France (which excludes its overseas territories) is divided into 94 administrative departments, numbered 1 to 95, except there is no department 20. Le Grand-Pressigny is in department 37. Paris is department 75, shown as the red dot on this map.
This small village of about 900 people is in the Indre-et-Loire region in central France, just a 90 minute TGV train ride from Paris (if you don’t take TGV, then you’ll have a much longer train ride, up to 4 hours). You can also take a bus from Paris, which we did earlier this year when the train workers went on strike. The bus ride is also about 4 hours. There is no train station in Le Grand-Pressigny, but from Paris, if you can get to either Chatellerault or Saint Pierre des Corps, and we’ll come pick you up there!
The Chateau at Le Grand-Pressigny sits above the village and now contains the Museum of Prehistory. The exhibits there contain extensive displays on all aspects of the Chalcolithic flint for which this area is known, as well as interactive terminals and excellent displays with information about the various groups of people who lived in this area over 100,000 years. Details here: http://www.prehistoiregrandpressigny.fr
The first chateau was erected during the 12th century and was gradually completed in the 15th and 16th centuries.
And the view from the chateau ain’t so bad either.
Have I said how excited we are to be moving to this adorable little village?
After seeing that Ugly House, we were hoping for something with more…charm, appeal, something attractive. The next house on the list was not so appealing, but it was in a pretty spot on a quiet stretch of road, with a nice curved driveway and a gated entrance. The Terrace House, at first glance, was pretty sad. It wasn’t old enough to have any charm, but it was on a nice large piece of land, with a beautiful wooded area just behind the house. This place needed some love and some updating, and it could be something very nice. We seriously considered this one, although it was not right in the center of the village, but just around the corner outside of town.
After staying the first 10 days in La Grange in Chaumussay, we moved into Les Balcons in Le Grand-Pressigny. We had been looking forward to staying in town, and being there for awhile confirmed that we definitely did want to live within that village.
Les Balcons is a sweet house right on the main street. It’s a 3 bedroom, 2 bath home with a stunning balcony on the upper floor.
Les Balcons has some unique and charming features, but we knew it was not the home for us.
Off we go.
Accompanied by the charming local real estate agent, we started our house search with this one. It quickly became apparent that we needed to give each house a name so we could refer to them later. This one, unfortunately, had to be called The Ugly House. The exterior was unquestionably that, but inside there were some wonderful features, mainly the incredible floor in what was the kitchen.
We loved our time in La Grange. (And I love that houses here have names.) Now that we’ve decided we want to move to France, we’re looking for a house to buy. La Grange is for sale, and has so many great things about it. However, it’s not in the village of Le Grand Pressigny, where we want to live.
We flew to Paris, rented a car at the airport, and with the help of a very accommodating GPS voice, managed to find our way, 3 1/2 hours later, to the little village of Chaumussay, where we stayed at La Grange for 10 days. Chaumussay is a tiny hamlet with very limited services, but most of these little towns are so close together (within 5 -15 minutes of each other), you are never very far from a small market and/or bakery.
Somehow we decided that leaving our comfy life in northern California, moving to rural France and buying and renovating a 300 yr old house was going to be a fun adventure. Off we go. Good or bad, this will be our place to keep people up-to-date on our crazy new life.