Do you dream of living in France, renovating a fixer upper, maybe a gorgeous mansion house in stunning rural countryside? Do you wander what real life is like moving to France?
We’re loving a new YouTube Channel created by a young couple from New Zealand who are doing just that. Their YouTube videos document the ups, downs and discoveries that come with starting a new life in France and renovating a house that sometimes (most of the time) doesn’t want to play nice. Sprinkled with a healthy dose of down-to-earth kiwi humour, the videos are warm, welcoming and easy to watch.
They call themselves Growing in France – reflecting their new lives, becoming part of the community, the house that they are renovating, their family growing. We talk to them about how they came to be in France…
Why move to France?
Jack and Becs (Rebecca) moved from New Zealand to France in 2019. They didn’t speak French and had no French heritage – but it felt like home. Becs (who was born in Zimbabwe but lived in NZ from childhood) first visited France in 2016 for a few weeks to visit her family who were holidaying in the Charente region. She felt a sense of belonging she’d never felt before. A year later she returned with husband Jack and their two small children to spend six months in a tiny one-bedroom gite in Saint-Simon, also in the Charente region. Jack, who worked remotely for an IT company, also fell head over heels for the French way of life.
“The Charentaise sun warms your heart, the river cleanses your soul, the grape vines, the sunflowers, the wild cherries, the sweeping vistas of lush countryside leading the way to many a Chateau, you can’t escape a sense of wonderment and awe. We were very much in love with life in France after those six months, especially our river-side lifestyle. We returned to New Zealand with definite plans to go back to France as soon as possible” says Becs.
Back in New Zealand they carefully considered their options. They’d just bought a house that needed renovating. All of their friends and family were there. But the allure of France still beckoned. In 2018 they went for a three-week holiday to the sunny Lot-et-Garonne, a department further south of the Charente.
“It’s an exquisite area of France, the river is breath-taking but doesn’t lend itself to being paddled in! It’s very different to the meandering of the Charente river, the Lot has gouged its path through rugged hilly terrain, it’s deep, and fast. But the Charente still had our hearts’ Becs says.
Returning to New Zealand they were by now determined to try for a new life in France. They finished renovating their house, sold it and packed all their belongings. They bought one-way tickets to Charles de Gaulle airport in Paris.
“And it really felt like we were going HOME” Jack says.
They made their way to Angouleme in the Charente where they rented an apartment for 18 days while they house-hunted.
“I don’t think it crossed my mind that allowing just 18 days was somewhat ridiculous. But 18 days is the time Jack could take off before he had to travel for work, and I was going to England with our children to see my family. So 18 days it was!’ laughs Becs
House hunting in France
“For us, house-hunting has always been a relatively short-term decision, more about what we can do to a house than what a house can do for us. This time we were looking for our forever home, somewhere for the children to grow up.”
It wasn’t an easy task. France has its own processes “instead of giving you an address so you can do a quick drive by, estate agents only divulge the address at the last moment, insisting on meeting you at some landmark in the nearest village and making you follow them to the house so you have to leave so much more time to do a viewing” says Jack.
They decided instead to drive from village to village looking for ‘A Vendre’ – for sale – signs. On the third day they parked their rental car in a riverside village aiming to take a stroll and explore the surroundings.
“It was there that we came face to face with our future. There was this idyllic little path along the river which took us around a bend and there stood an impressive Maison de Maître. It was complete with closed shutters and a heavily overgrown garden – signs I had come to recognize as synonymous with ‘For Sale’. And there it was, “A Vendre” in all its handwritten glory hanging from the gate. I was actually jumping up and down when I saw it, and telling the kids this was our new home, without stepping past the gates, or knowing the price. Jack was horrified!”
The couple called the owner and made plans to view the house that day. Their hearts dropped when they stepped through the front door. The house was completely uninhabitable, having barely been touched since they used the long drop toilet that “flushes” right into the river (and is still there!). The 9-roomed house came with barns, a large garden and a longère (a single storey farmhouse).
“There was no denying that this house ticked just about all of our boxes” says Jack. “But we really hoped our budget would allow us to buy a home, and have some money left over to immediately start any improvements needed. But this house was all our money, and then some. So we diligently followed through and it felt like we viewed pretty much every house in the Charente within (and without) our budget.”
The couple found they’d seriously overestimated what their budget would get them. Everything they could afford needed a lot of work. They considered compromising. They’d dreamed of a maison de maitre but they could get something smaller. They wanted to be in their dream location, but they could move further away.
“We knew we’d probably be spending money on this house until we die, but maybe, just maybe, it could be ours, all four crumbling walls and leaky roof” says Jack. And so they bought it.
Over the years they have “chopped, ripped, plastered, and worn deep tracks directly from our house to the decheterie (the dump) with load after load piled high with all sorts of rubbish. Some days the ‘dream’ is not reality as we find ourselves covered in sewage, (more often than we’d care to think about!) flooded(!), breaking our backs, taming the garden, freezing cold, constantly blowing fuses, going without water for days. Some days I look at the Maison de Maître and think the rocks it’s made out of might fetch a nice price, the fireplaces are marble. We 100% bit off more than we could ever chew” muses Becs.
“Other days, the reality is so far beyond the dream. We came here alone, but our village welcomed us with open arms. Our children are happy at the local school, bilingual, and have introduced us to plenty of new friends. Some of the best people we’ve met. We’ve cultivated our vegetable garden and love to see our children bite into cucumbers, tomatoes, and melons straight from the vine – these have been some of the happiest moments of my life.”
“The last few years have disappeared in a blink and the dream of the Maison de maître remains just that, a figment of our imagination.”
Work commitments, kids – they came as four and are now five, a need to learn how to renovate have all been priorities. But now they share their dream, their work and their lives in France on YouTube and have an ever growing following.
“We have grown in many ways since moving to France. Our mentality has shifted a lot. France forces a slower pace of life, prioritizing family, community, good food, great wine. We’ve become much braver, and while at first the width of the stone walls terrified us, we now seem to have no qualms busting through them at every opportunity. We’re more comfortable with where our hardware stores are, what they sell, and what they don’t. We finally feel confident enough to rectify all the problems we have been turning a blind eye to, to roll up our sleeves and get stuck into turning this dream into a reality.
“During the Covid lockdown I felt isolated and found a community on Instagram. We shared stories of our lives, we made connections and friendships. It made France feel more like home where we knew people and belonged. We moved to France alone, we have no family here, but suddenly it felt like we did. Once the restrictions were lifted and life slowly returned to the new normal, we now had people to invite to gatherings and celebrations, people to call on in an emergency, people to laugh with over cups of coffee, and to share exciting life changes like new babies, new jobs, and renovation successes!
Putting your life online is not for everyone but both Jack and I love to share and to create, and if we can help, inspire, simply connect with, or at the very least, entertain others in a similar situation or thinking of doing the same thing, then it’s worth it. We are also having the most fun making these videos together, and considering we are currently living in a building site, a bit of fun goes a long way to making it all bearable. When we bought the place, the previous owner described it as a “projet de vie” (Life’s project) and he was right. We have an endless amount of work to do, which means we have an endless supply of content to share. Our dream is to completely renovate the whole property: the longere, the maison de maître, the barn and the gardens. If sharing our adventures can add to the fun and the funds, then we’d be crazy to stop.
It’s fascinating to watch their progress with the gorgeous house, to see them settle into their new life, make new discoveries, exploring France and sharing their adventures – the good and the bad. There are disasters, things go wrong, but they keep embracing the challenges through the tears and laughter, their enthusiasm shines through. It’s real life in France. And it makes for really great viewing.
Join Jack and Becs on YouTube and subscribe to watch their weekly video updates about renovating and travelling in France: youtube.com/growinginfrance
