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Has anyone else signed up to a one year Mandat de Gestion with Maeva or other operator eg Lagrange? We have done so with Maeva after PV did not renew our lease. It means we still get the VAT cover. Maeva seems unable to keep the concierges in our area so Lagrange who also offer a lease in our residence (which we don’t want!) have offered a Mandat de Gestion too but with 40% fees to them! Curious if others have experience of these contracts?
Why did P & V not renew your lease?
Anita,
Is it 40% for the full mandate? The fees in general are around 30-35% for this kind of mandate with concierge services.
Regards,
Eddy
Hi
Firstly PV did not renew the lease as they decided the site was not viable any more. They offered a mandat de gestion with their sister company renewable annually. We have to pay all the charges. We hope to continue with this but Maeva had difficulty with finding a concierge this year and were lucky to get someone last minute.
Lagrange took on the remaining PV leases after a year's gap and operate on site in any case so they would be able to offer a conciergerie service but it looks like they would charge a lot more.
Thank you Eddy for the advice about average costs for this service. Currently we pay 25% but often the original catalogue price is seriously discounted to get the lets so there is not much actual income so obviously we want to keep costs down. That would probably be the same for a different operator.
Am I still also right in thinking that if the appartment continues to be let out para hotel with key welcome, cleaning after stays, sheets/towels provided and tva included in charge to tourists, we meet the criteria for not refunding the tva saved on purchase?
Thanks for replies.
Hi - I am new to the forum so hello to all reading this. I recently received a letter from P&V basically telling me that they are not going to renew the lease come end April 2021 and this is due to, in their words 'The changing context and economic actors, the rise of digital technologies, the emergence of new online players have all contributed to reducing operating margins of tourism operations'. So this now seems not financially viable for them going forward.
They also point me in the direction of Maeva.com mandate which I know is a subsidiary of P&V. I was wondering how this works, and does it provide a decent return on renting the property.
The issue I have is that I mortgaged this apartment 10yrs ago as a long term investment, hoping that it would indeed be leased for 20yrs that P&V would have liked. This may be a blessing in disguise for some whereby in this scenario P&V are terminating the lease and not the landlord so no charges involved. However, this puts me in a position whereby I need to get a return to cover the costs at least.
P&V also mention in their letter about the option to sell the property and to contact their Real estate advisors for support in this. However, after doing some research myself and contacting an estate agent (Sextant) they seriously undervalued the property at nearly 50% of what I paid for it which is my most concern. I have read elsewhere that it is the Notaires duty to make sure a property is sold at the correct market rate etc. however, if the estate agents are correct then I’m struggling to see how the property could be worth so much less over a 10yr period than what i paid for it.
I would appreciate any advice/knowledge and experience of the above and any advice as I am still not sure on what route to take, as I stated above, I would be happy if I could at least cover my mortgage and costs.
If there is anyone else that has a property in the same residence as mine in La Plagne Les Lauzes then I would be happy to get in touch.
Best regards,
Jon.
Hi Jon,
It is often the case for P&V to get out of a residence they judge not reliable financially. In many cases the residence need to keep the tourism status like it is for yours it seems. Them proposing Maeva to take it on is to give an option for the owners but it is not always the best option around and so an investigation could be necessary. One thing you need to take in consideration is the VAT, which you have normally recovered at the purchase time. You need to keep the property rented with services for a period of 20 years. If it is not with a commercial lease, it needs to be a lease or a mandate offering essential services. Normally Maeva offers this but others too. Maeva's mandate are normally for 3 years.
What you have to note is that you will be responsible for charges like: water, electricity, maintenance, taxe d'habitation so it will make a difference. You will not be only responsible for the mortgage cost (interests).
Regarding the rent, in this case Maeva (or anyone else) will be looking to rent the property, if successful they will take a percentage of the rent (Maeva I believe it is 35%) but if it is not rented unfortunately there won't be any rent.
If you want to sign with Maeva or if you were to sign with them, you have to make sure Pierre et Vacances is fully gone from the building or the rental will go first to the apartments remaining in commercial lease.
It is sometimes more interesting to have mandates depending on the situation of the apartment, if it is more attractive than others etc...
Regarding selling the apartment and valuation, loosing Pierre et Vacances with the commercial lease and the returns they were offering could be one of the reason for the difference but I will STRONGLY suggest for you to get another valuation as certain agents would value it low to sale, sale, sale without your interests in mind (at all). Of course it is difficult to trust anyone but still.
Regards,
Eddy Regnier
Hi Jon
with regard to Maeva.com, we have remained with them since PV pulled out on us in 2017 although most other owners signed up to a new lease with Lagrange who have taken over the site.
Maeva offered us a one year renewable mandate which gets renewed tacitly every year but so far the commission they take has remained the same.
We have to offer a minimum of 8 weeks rental including 3 weeks in high season. We are also able to use our appartment by blocking weeks for own occupation. We are not charged for this unless we want cleaning services. In respect this works well for us. We could just let it out with them for the whole year. They charge us for an annual clean and technical checks but we tend to do this.
Until last year they were not brilliant at getting us rentals but ironically 2020 has seen the most bookings ever at a decent rate probably because French tourists had to holiday in France. Brittany was particularly popular. Our appartment is now advertised as Maeva Particuliers as they no longer have a permanent presence on site. This has given a problem for clients as the key handover has to be done in the car park or by the appartment door and the concierges have not always been very prompt.
We have to pay all the charges out of the rent but have not had to refund the VAT as the appartment is rented out on a para hotelier basis. We can still use all the site facilities including the pool as we contribute to its costs. Currently it is unclear who owns the pool as in fact PV owned it.(you might want to check this for your site) The Coopropriete is trying to buy it from PV at a low price so there are likely to be more charges. Our clients can also use the pool.
Like you, in order to continue to pay the costs and get some revenue to cover these, we need to continue renting out. Our only alternative was a new lease with Lagrange at less rental but tying us I for another 10 years, or this arrangement with Maeva. Lagrange have now offered a one year mandate too but the terms are worse and it would mean that they would only rent out our appartment if the leasebacks they hold were fully booked whereas with Maeva our appartment is let when the other operator might still have vacancies so it is more competitive and more likely to let in low season.
Good luck with your decisions.
Hi Kodelig/Eddy - Many thanks for your input. Its been over a month now since I last posted here, but I have been mulling over my options.
I can confirm the mandate on offer with Maeva is indeed the same/similar to kodelig mentioned above; 12mth mandate with 25% rental charge, 8 weeks minimum to Maeva along with a 399 euro yearly fee. I have decided to give this a try as the apartment I have is in a popular ski resort and Maeva have confirmed that the residence rents for 72% of the year for the weeks available (26 weeks), they too confirmed due to CV-19 they had a bumper summer as nationals went into the mountains for holidays. Maeva also state that P&V will be leaving the residence altogether come end April 21.
Maeva have always been present in this residence under the P&V banner as the residence is a collection of several Chalet apartments with a reception area/pool etc. under co-ownership. So, im hoping its business as usual when we get out of this pandemic situation.
In relation to covering costs etc. and potential for selling. I contacted 2 other estate agents of which one of them being P&V's own re-seller service. They too seem to state the property being valued less than what I expected as with selling fee, this would put me in slight debt to cover repaying the mortgage with no guarantee that the new buyer would continue any kind of para-hotel service to cover any VAT clawback. (Although, I find this would be unlikely due to the type of residence this is, and if purchaser was buying as investment).
P&V are still in commercial contract until end April '21 so they are due to pay me rental up until that date with the exception of 2 months at the beginning of the pandemic they wrote about to me about not paying for.
I guess I will just have to see how the next 12 months pan out then re-assess; if I can sustain this for a few more years then I would be in a better position to sell and walk away with no debt. I wish in hindsight I'd never have signed up to this as with most people in this forum, but trying to be positive going forward if the aformentioned mandate proposal works out.
Feel free to add any thoughts/advice to the above as it helps everyone in this rediculous sitution..
Best regards,
Jon..