Truques do agente imobiliário

You just need to take a drive around any part of the French Riviera and it becomes very clear that there are too many real estate agencies here. There’s at least one on every commercial block, if not several. It’s easier to find a real estate agency than a place to buy coffee — by far.

Não é de surpreender que os corretores imobiliários na Riviera Francesa sejam extremamente competitivos. Há milhares de corretores, todos brigando por um número relativamente pequeno de imóveis, lutando para pagar o aluguel com pouquíssimas vendas. Em suma, é uma receita para todo tipo de mau comportamento.

Some 62% of estate agencies inspected by the state have been found to have broken the law.

Muito parecido qualquer industry where the monetary incentives are not aligned with the incentive of being honest with the buyer, this type of system forces agents to either look out for their own financial interests OR be honest with buyers. It’s not surprising then, that they prioritize making more money above being transparent with buyers. It’s not that agents are bad people (they have families to feed, too); the problem lies in the fact that o sistema é configurado de uma forma que incentiva o mau comportamento. Quanto mais você paga a mais, mais lucro eles obtêm.

A situação é tão grave que a maioria das imobiliárias (62% em 2020 e 63% em 2023) inspecionadas pelo estado foram consideradas culpadas de infringir a lei por meio de anúncios enganosos. 1.740 profissionais imobiliários foram auditados pela DGCCRF em 2020 e 2023. As infrações comuns estão relacionadas a informações incompletas ou incorretas fornecidas aos clientes, táticas de vendas enganosas, exibição de anúncios de imóveis que não estão realmente à venda (e depois dizer aos potenciais compradores que "acabaram de receber uma oferta") ou imóveis listados incorretamente como "novos" ou "exclusivos".

Muitas agências também não querem realmente vender uma vila porque estão obtendo uma renda consistente alugando-a como aluguel de férias e cobrando 20% mais taxas sobre cada aluguel.

Dica: When working with agents, use a temporary email address and a different, fake surname with each agent. There’s no need (especially since you should never sign anything with the agent), and why would you want your real name to be in all those databases? Also, that way you’ll have less issues with agents refusing to work with each other (as explained below).

How Real Estate Agents Operate

No single agent has access to everything on the market. Not even close.

In France, there’s no central database of all the properties that are for sale. Each agency has their own listings, and only if they realmente Se não conseguem encontrar um comprador, muitas vezes se abrem para a ideia de colaborar com outros corretores. Publicam alguns dos seus anúncios online (aqueles que estão com dificuldade para vender) e mantêm o restante em segredo (chamados de "fora do mercado") para que outros corretores não os descubram.

Most owners (the savvy ones) list with 2 or 3 agencies. Agencies often don’t like to work with each other because it means splitting commission. This is why, as a buyer, you’ll need to contact (and work directly with) as many agencies as possible. Many agents on the French Riviera won’t proactively follow up with new listings, so you’ll need to message them regularly to remind them that you exist.

Muitas agências também não querem realmente vender vilas a menos que possam ganhar uma comissão enorme, porque estão lucrando com isso ao receber 20% de comissão mais taxas toda vez que encontram alguém para alugá-las como um

Licenses & Insurance

Since there are many illegal 'real estate agents' trying to make money off French Riviera property, it’s very important that you make sure any agent you’re working closely with is legal by asking for three things: their license to practice (carte professionelle), indemnity insurance, and fidelity bond (piece de garantie) detalhes.

Não se preocupe – é perfeitamente normal e aceitável pedir comprovantes desses documentos. Isso ajudará a protegê-lo caso algo dê errado. Se não houver fiança, tudo bem, apenas certifique-se de pagar o valor ao notário (o que você realmente deveria fazer de qualquer maneira). Agentes licenciados devem exibir todos esses detalhes em seus escritórios e fornecer detalhes sobre esses três itens em todas as correspondências e contratos.

You can also find licensed agents through two estate agent associations: FNAIM e SNPI. This also gives you an extra place to complain to if something goes wrong.

Beware Foreign & Illegal ‘Agents’

Only work with agents that have an office in the area where you're looking for a villa. Local agents will know the area best and might be able to give you access to ‘off-market’ villas that they think they can sell quickly without needing to pay for publicity. They will also be more likely to be legally licensed to practice — and you definitely want to make sure the agent you’re working with is licensed and insured.

Alguns agentes estrangeiros ou não licenciados alegarão ser o 'agente de listagem' ou 'agente exclusivo', mas na verdade não são, e podem surpreendê-lo com uma exigência de taxas extras no final (que você não tem obrigação de pagar!) ou ocultar taxas no preço listado. Por esta razão, evite agentes e serviços globais / do Reino Unido / não locais, and don’t sign anything with an agent — all contracts should be done via the notaire. And certainly don’t ever give an agent money (again, only give money to the notaire).

Buyer’s Agents / Property Finders

What is a buyer agent?

Agentes de compra (também chamados de "Property Finders") são uma novidade na França (desde aproximadamente o ano 2000). Eles anunciam que entrarão em contato com todas as imobiliárias e pesquisarão sobre as casas fora do mercado. Alguns também afirmam que farão o possível para pesquisar sobre vendas privadas.

Limitations:

Since they all split the commission with the listing agent, they will all miss out on properties where the listing agent doesn't want to split the commission. Many agencies, especially the well-known ones, refuse to split commissions (unless the villa has been on the market for ages). This means that unless you are directly in contact with those agencies, you might not find out about the best villas they have for sale.

Regular agents posing as buyer agents:

An agent who works for an agency that lists villas for sale can não also be a true buyer’s agent, although some will try to convince you they can. Regular agents will not be able to find out about other agencies ‘off-market’ villas (since the whole reason they’re kept off-market/secret is to avoid having other listing agents find out about & steal them), and will try to get you to pay as much as possible (since they make commission-based compensation).

Local versus international:

The more local they are, the better. There’s no way someone in the UK can know about private sales on the French Riviera — that takes weekly in-person relationship-building and meetings with locals. Find a buyer’s agent who is based near where you want to buy, and speaks French as their first-language, so that even xenophobic old locals will be friendly and let them know about private sales.

Payment:

Alguns agentes do comprador cobram uma taxa adicional ao comprador após a finalização da venda (mas também ficam com metade da comissão do agente imobiliário — o que eles podem ou não admitir para você), mas a maioria não cobra nada do comprador e, em vez disso, apenas divide a comissão com os agentes que estão dispostos a fazer isso (nem todos estão!).

Some sleazy buyer’s agents will ask for a retainer (money up-front), mostly because they’re chronically unsuccessful in finding villas and their only income is these initial payments. Nunca pay in advance. In fact, never pay them at all. Let them get paid from the listing agent / seller. If you do agree to pay them a few thousand euros extra, you should only ever pay a buyer’s agent if they find you a villa that you purchase — e somente quando a compra estiver 100% concluída.

Can you trust them?

It’s the same as with listing agents. Since they’re paid a commission based on the sale price, they’ll be incentivized to find a way to manipulate you into paying more than you need to. That’s why you can't listen to their advice and it’s still up to you to do your own research to determine the correct offer price.

Contracts:

If they ask for a contract, you can simply say that you don't want to sign a contract at all, or at least until you’ve found the villa you want to buy. If they protest, don’t give in. They will eventually agree to still work with you. If you decide to sign a contract at some point (this should really only happen once they find a villa you want to buy), then there are things to know before you sign:

• Make sure the contract is ‘simple’ and not ‘exclusive’. Make 100% sure that the contract does not have anything about exclusivity in it, otherwise you’ll owe them money even if they are completely unhelpful (which many are) and you find a villa another way.
• Ask for proof that they’re licensed and insured.
• Certifique-se de entender tudo no contrato. A maioria dos contratos será em inglês.
• The contract should say that you don’t owe them any money, or that the buyer’s agent gets paid only when the sale is complete. It should state that they will share the commission with the listing agent, paid by the seller, and that the buyer agent will not charge the buyer any fee.

Who to Trust? A Warning

The main thing to always remember is that real estate agents (and notaires) get paid when you complete the purchase, and the more you spend, the more profit they make. They are paid a percentage of the sale price, and eles só serão pagos se você concluir a compra da villa. So, naturally, they are incentivized to be very optimistic about both the market and whatever villa you’re considering.

That’s why many will tell potential buyers that a villa with major mold and structural issues is “in perfect condition”, or deliberately inflate the m², or tell you other lies and half-truths to get you to buy at the highest price possible.

Given this, it’s important that you do your own checking to see if all the structures on the property were built legally, and to check the other things listed in this guide. Don’t expect agents to be honest about any aspect of the property — você are the only person who will look out for your interests. It’s up to you to hire independent experts (who get paid whether you buy the villa or not) to double-check everything.

Those who are in the business of promoting villa rentals will also encourage people to buy. If you buy a villa then realize you overpaid and can’t resell it, that’s good news for people who make a living organizing villa vacation rentals, as your next step will likely be to enlist them to help you rent it. (Keep in mind that these rental brokers charge 20% commission, and the government charges a 40% rental tax, so you’ll make less than half of the rental price).

(Dishonest) Things Agents Tell You

Given the misaligned incentives, sempre do your own research, and watch out for these things that some agents say:

“The market is super hot right now!”

Agencies sempre want you to believe that it’s a super-hot market and prices are going up, as this pressures buyers into feeling like they should buy sooner and for more money, and it incentivizes sellers to list their homes. Even in obviously soft or declining markets, many agents and notaires will often tell you that it’s a hot market. Here’s the real state of the real estate market on the French Riviera.

“This villa is new to market!”

Emails with real estate listings often say “new listing” or “new to market” when the villa has already been listed for sale for many months or years. Don’t pay attention when the agent says it’s ‘new’. Instead, take a look at the date on the diagnostics.

“You can’t base your m² pricing on the notaire’s website (‘DVF’) because _____.”

They may give any number of lies for this, such as that the notaries don’t count villas purchased using a SCI (they do — they count todos residential real estate transactions no matter who pays for them), that they include non-publicly offered or inter-family sales of property for a low price (they don’t), that wealthy people remove their sale from it for privacy (this is not allowed), or that the notaire’s published sale prices are somehow incorrectly low (they’re definitely not incorrectly low –in fact they’re incorrectly high!– and this is regulated by French law to increase transparency.) In fact, the published sold prices include TVA (tax paid)!

Here’s a guide to coming up with your offer price.

“The market has exploded / prices have gone up since the notaires last published the sale prices…”

Again, that is 100% certainly não true, as the French Riviera’s real estate market is like molasses — it’s muito slow-moving. Besides that, their claim is also completely unverifiable and there’s no way an agent could know this. The apenas way to know the trends of the real estate market prices is via the notaires published sale prices (more on the market trends here), which is updated every 6 months. Agents are famous for lying about sale prices, and even if they were being honest, they would only know about deles sales, and they are 1 out of over 1500 agents on the French Riviera!

“This villa is on an expensive street, so the price is justified.” ou “The house down the street sold for €_____.” or “I recently sold several villas in this area for over €_____.”

First, you can verify if it is by searching the past sales, which are listed on the DVF website — but with incorrectly low m²). If those sales aren’t listed, then assume that it’s probably not true. Second, the price per m² should still be within the notaire’s published price range (more on this here), which includes todo villa on todo street in that area/town, including todos the ‘special’ expensive streets. Thirdly, just because one buyer didn’t do their research and overpaid, doesn’t mean you should.

“That villa has just been sold / just received an offer!”

There are several reasons why an agent might tell you this:

• There’s a chance it could be true (but you’ll need to make sure.)
• Some agents refuse to work with other agents (for various reasons, usually because they don’t want to share the commission), resulting in the agent you’re working with telling you a property has sold when it hasn’t, so make sure to double-check with the listing agent.
• It could be a false listing designed to get you to contact the agency, for a villa that was never really for sale.
• If you are an educated buyer and know that a villa is overpriced, an agent might tell you a villa got an offer to get you to bid above market, and when you don’t, they might say it sold. But this is often simply because they know that the seller is just speculating and not interested in selling at a fair price, so saying it sold is intended to make you think you’re wrong about the market (that villas are selling for more, and more often, than they are).
• Another reason why an agent might say this is when an owner decides to take their villa off the market because it’s not selling — agents won’t say this, obviously, so instead they pretend they sold it. Check the notaires published sales to verify.

Lembre-se: muitos negócios fracassam; um imóvel com uma oferta está longe de ser um negócio fechado (na verdade, mais de 50% das ofertas fracassam, principalmente porque o banco não garante a hipoteca de uma oferta claramente superfaturada) e a vila pode acabar voltando ao mercado em um mês.

“They already turned down an offer for [insert above-market price here].”

This is almost always not true. This is a very common tactic used by agents to make you think the villa is in demand, and to get you to offer more than market value. If the number is very high, they may also be trying to scare you off because the listing agent won’t share the commission, or because they know that the seller doesn’t really want to sell.

“The villa already sold but the buyer couldn’t get a mortgage.”

This may or may not be true. If it’s true, the most likely reason they couldn’t get a mortgage was because the bank’s valuation / appraisal showed that the buyer’s offer was way above market value. So, if it’s true, that almost certainly means that the villa is very overpriced, even at the offer price that was accepted. If it’s not true, then the agent is saying this to manipulate you into thinking that it’s a desirable villa that other people are willing to pay for.

“They are considering an offer, so you’ll need to act quickly!”

This is not true most of the time (but once in a while it is, however, the offer amount they tell you is almost always much higher than the actual offer). This is a common tactic used to put pressure on you, to make the villa seem like it’s desirable, and to get you to quickly bid a higher amount than their (fictional) ‘offer amount’. Our advice: offer market value then wait and see.

“It’s an investment – you’ll make the money back when you sell…”

This is simply not true anywhere, but especially in France, where the market has been flat-lined for about 15 years. Buyers have no idea what you paid for your villa, and even if they did, it wouldn’t matter, as villas will sell for whatever the market value is at that time. Real estate is like any other market: it has ups and downs, and people lose money on their ‘investment’ all the time.

“It’s priced at market value. You can see by searching for villas for sale in the area.”

Agents who say this are trying to confuse you. The asking / listing / for sale prices are NOT ‘market value’; they are the prices nobody is willing to pay (otherwise, those villas would already be sold!) Instead, it is the SOLD prices (the m² prices that villas have actually sold for) that determine the ‘market value’ (what villas in that town are worth).

“You can definitely expand the m².”

A classic trick is they get deles architect contact to “verify” that you can expand a property, but then once you buy it, they all ghost you and you find out the hard way that it’s not possible to expand the m² (even if ‘it keeps the same footprint’). This has happened to several contacts of ours and seems to be common practice. The only way to know if you can expand it is to get proper planning permission approval from the Mairie, and double-check it at the Mairie in person.

Articles That Quote Agents

Many journalists publish articles that are sponsored by real estate agencies. These articles (like all paid-for sponsored content) lack any journalistic integrity. They almost always give sales statistics that are not backed up Pelos notários. Qualquer agente ou agência que alegue que o mercado está mudando está se baseando apenas nas informações da sua própria agência (uma entre centenas de agências nesta área) e, como não há como verificar o que eles dizem, não se pode presumir que esteja correto.

Any article that states that the market is going up by a % or states how the market is doing, that doesn’t directly link to their source, is not credible. The only source that can accurately say what % increases the market is doing, is the notaires. Period. They are the only group with todos as informações de vendas.

Even then, when the notaires state the % that market prices are changing, keep in mind that since they don’t specify correct m² along with the sale prices (and these price stats are always based on the per-m² price), there’s no way to correctly estimate the % increase or decrease in sale prices. Until the government forces notaires to accurately report the m² of sold properties, there is simply no accurate way to say the % that the market prices are increasing or decreasing.

Articles that state that huge amounts of Americans (or insert country here) are buying property in France are also sponsored garbage. The notaires publish stats about the % of sales by foreigners and the last stat they published was in 2016 (as stated in their fall 2022 report), which stated that only 5.2% of buyers are not French. Again, there’s no way for any agent to know these stats unless the notaires publish them.

Como responder 'Qual é o seu orçamento?'

Since so many properties are dramatically overpriced, the best way to answer this question is to say this: “We don’t have a budget. We will pay market value. We will get two appraisals –including one by our bank– and will base our offer on those. So show us everything that matches what we’re looking for and we’ll deal with the offer price once we find one we like.” Then, you will craft your offer by following this guide.

Do You Need an Agent?

Você pode achar isso chocante, mas apenas 58% de todas as vendas de vilas são feitas por meio de agentes imobiliários, e muitos deles são vendidos “fora do mercado” aos seus clientes (ou desenvolvedores, que então dão ao agente outra comissão quando ele o revende) sem a necessidade de publicar o anúncio on-line.

O restante é vendido em leilões, diretamente por tabeliães (4% das vendas) ou por meio de vendas privadas em jornais locais, redes sociais, sites de classificados ou imprensa especializada em imóveis (anunciados pelo proprietário). Isso ocorre porque os corretores imobiliários cobram entre 4% e 10%, e muitos proprietários preferem tentar vender de outra forma, negociando apenas com corretores se não conseguirem encontrar um comprador por conta própria.

Assim que um corretor adquire um imóvel, ele primeiro tenta oferecê-lo "fora do mercado" para incorporadoras. Depois, discretamente, o oferece aos seus clientes e a outros corretores com quem mantém parcerias. Se nenhum deles encontrar um comprador interessado, é aí que começam a pagar para anunciá-lo.

They hold off on making the listing public for as long as possible because publicly advertising it invites competition from other agencies (other agents find it on Google Earth and approach the seller, so eles vão (ganham a comissão se a venderem). Então, normalmente, se uma vila não é vendida até o momento em que é anunciada publicamente, é porque está superfaturada ou tem problemas.

For these reasons, it’s best to look for villas on your own, and also contact as many agents as possible, so you’re more likely to get told about the “off-market” properties.

Dica: You can make a pedido para obter informações de propriedade de qualquer villa and approach homeowners directly.

Comprar uma moradia? Leia isto primeiro!

Quando estiver pronto para procurar um imóvel, leia nosso guia completo para comprar imóveis na França. Estes guias explicam como estimar o valor de uma propriedade real valor, como obter o melhor preço e evitar preços excessivos, o que observar, como evitar golpes e muito mais.

Primeiro, para compreender o mercado imobiliário em França, é necessário compreender como o preço por m² é uma farsa gigante. Então, você pode passar para os outros guias:

Nosso guia para onde o mercado está indo inclui: previsões do mercado imobiliário da Riviera Francesa, tendências atuais e históricas de preços no mercado e as razões pelas quais os preços continuarão a cair. Além disso, complementar guia para russos e seu impacto no mercado imobiliário da Riviera Francesa.

Nosso guia para listagens de imóveis inclui: como encontrar moradias para venda, o que procurar, desinformação e avisos, leilões e execuções hipotecárias, compra direta dos vendedores, por que o tempo é tudo e a razão pela qual apenas cerca de metade das vendas de moradias são listadas publicamente.

Nosso guia para golpes e segredos Inclui: avisos sobre os truques antiéticos que agentes, notários, vendedores, incorporadoras e construtoras usam para extorquir mais dinheiro de você. Esta é uma leitura obrigatória e o guia para denunciantes que os profissionais do ramo não querem que você veja.

Nosso guia para preços e determinação do valor de mercado de uma villa inclui: por que há tantos preços excessivos, como estimar o valor de mercado de uma villa (quanto vale) e um guia passo a passo para encontrar o preço de oferta.

Nosso guia de coisas importantes para descobrir inclui: relatórios e pesquisas de diagnóstico, sol e microclimas, possíveis problemas com a vista, impostos habitacionais, idade, acesso à Internet e móvel, zonas de perigo (vermelhas), riscos à saúde, questões de privacidade e espaço, problemas próximos, o que você ' na verdade, possuirei adições e estruturas ilegais, por que estão vendendo, como verificar e muito mais.

Nosso guia para coisas a considerar inclui: seu real custos, problemas com a compra de uma villa 'recém-renovada', aprendizagem sobre crimes e invasores locais e perguntas a fazer a si mesmo.

Nosso guia para o processo de compra inclui: negociar o preço e a oferta inicial, escolher um notário honesto, comprar no azul, a oferta oficial e o depósito, usar um SCI, armadilhas contratuais, o período de reflexão, o que fazer antes de entregar o dinheiro e o assinatura definitiva.

Nosso guia para depois de comprar inclui: armadilhas de seguros, dicas para segundas residências, aluguel de villa, reformas e o que saber sobre contratação de pessoas.

Guia para vendedores: Como definir o preço da sua villa para que ela seja vendida.