Easy in Essoyes

Champagne is more than just a bubbly wine. Champagne is a region in France from where the bubbly comes. Champagne that isn’t produced in Champagne is not Champagne(!) and while the bubbly gets an awful lot of attention, the region deserves even more — as it’s certainly one of the country’s most beautiful and desirable regions in which to live.

Champagne is only about 160km (100 miles) from Paris, making it very accessible. “The viticultural boundaries of Champagne are legally defined and split into five wine producing districts within the administrative province: Aube, Côte des Blancs, Côte de Sézanne, Montagne de Reims, and Vallée de la Marne. The towns of Reims and Épernay are the commercial centers of the area.” (Wikipedia.org)

Map to the Hulstrand Chalet

About ten years ago, I had the pleasure of helping an American couple purchase their dream home in Champagne. They had met in their youth picking grapes in a vineyard and fell in love with each other and the region. It was a struggle, but with financing they were able to purchase the property — a chalet-style home on a triangular-shaped wooded property with a pool just on the edge of the village were Renoir lived and painted in his later years — Essoyes in the Aube.

I spent this past weekend with the owner, writer/author/teacher Janet Hulstrand, driving to Essoyes and taking-in the weekend festival celebrating “Les Chevalets d’Essoyes (The Easels of Essoyes) featuring the artists of the village. You may have already read all about it in Monday’s Parler Paris Nouvellettre®  (and I urge you do so!). It is here where Janet has held several “Writing from the Heart” workshops.

As we walked around the quintessential French village of Essoyes, strolling down the many winding cobblestoned streets, walking the same paths as Renoir and his family walked, we noticed several properties for sale — some in very poor condition needing complete renovation and others that had been beautifully regentrified.

Interestingly enough, most of the properties for sale in Essoyes were offered by local Notarial offices rather than real estate agencies. Those for sale by agencies were located in the nearby medieval town of Troyes. According to Immoprix.com, prices begin at about 70,000€ for a skeleton of an old house that requires a complete rebuilding to mansions of up to 1 million euros. The average home price in the area around Troyes is from 110,000€ to 170,000€.

Older house prices in Aube

Older house prices in Troyes

Over the weekend Janet declared she and artist/musician Steve were interested in selling their chalet home, now that their sons were grown and their lives had changed. The house is situated on a road just outside of Essoyes on one-half hectare of wooded property. You enter large gates to a parking area and a small structure that serves Steve as his atelier. You walk down a path to enter the house at the rear of the property where it is secluded. The house has am entry, large living room/dining room, large kitchen and toilet on the main level leading to a patio, pool and yard. On the upper level are two bedrooms, one of which is large enough to make into two, a full bath and each bedroom has it’s own balcony. The home was recently built prior to their purchase of it and therefore the appliances and fixtures are relatively new.

From the balcony I watched hundreds of birds fly into the trees. At the pool we wallowed in the cool water and enjoyed the warm sun. On the patio we barbecued pork chops and all in all, took in the serenity of the setting and beauty of the landscape and the village.

For an ideal second home in the countryside, this is it. If you are interested in learning more, email me at [email protected].

A bientôt,

Adrian Leeds

The Adrian Leeds Group

(with Janet Hulstrand at Artist Anne Fierobe’s Atelier)

Respond to Adrian: [email protected]

P.S. There will be no FPI on Thursday, August 7, for annual vacation.

P.P.S. Attend the Living and Investing in France Mini Conference — Nice and the Côte d’Azur on Tuesday, September 16, 2014 from 6:30 p.m. to 9 p.m. You’ll learn how to own a “pied-à-terre” of your own on the Riviera, in Paris or a home in the countryside that you can enjoy when you want…or profitably rent when you like…or just make a smart investment, plus ask me all of your questions about owning property in France. Register now and join us in Nice!