“FOR SALE”: A SIGN OF THE TIMES
Lawn after lawn, window after window, the “for sale” sign is fast becoming a common sight all across America. Another is the “for rent” sign, now frequently found in the bleak bay windows of empty shops. These signs quite literally serve as one of the clearest illustrations of our current economic crisis. No need to learn the story behind each of these signs – it is almost always the same one.
Since Christmas, several shops in my neighborhood have put this sign up in their windows, and not one has budged yet. Not long ago these same shops would have been swept up in no time, and a new merchant would have already opened a new business. Similarly, when I look up I see apartments for sale all around me, again with no sign of being snatched up any time soon. Indeed, it has been a long time since I have seen the proud display of one of those flamboyant “sold” signs that make realtors and sellers so happy.
Yes, the visible signs of the crisis have crept into Paris, and have spread all along the Rue Notre Dame de Lorette, from the church to the end of the street, where one can see the Moulin Rouge from the traffic light. Only the few hôtels particuliers which are in effect large mansions or small castles found inside the city in a few historical residential neighborhood such as the square, Place Saint Georges, but also Le Marais, St Germain des Prés, shaping this square, are the exception. I drafted this issue during the second week of February. Now that this issue is ready to be published, two weeks later, I now have seen the first sign offering office space for rent in the nicest of those mansions.
THE OBLIGATION TO SUBMIT THE “DIAGNOSTICS”
FOR REAL-ESTATE TRANSACTIONS IN FRANCE
With the crisis also come scavengers and crooks who try to take advantage of the situation. To curtail crooked real-estate deals, the French legal system protects transactions through the intervention of the “notaire”, a profession created by Napoléon over two centuries ago. The “notaire” wears several hats, but in this case, he fully clears the property title and secures the rights of both buyer and seller, all the while remaining completely impartial in his treatment of the interests of both parties.
Much more recently, legislation was passed to further protect the public from unscrupulous real-estate agents and sellers in France. If the “loi Carrez” had already made it an offense to lie about the size of a property – since the price is usually directly determined by calculating the size times the price-per-square-meter of a specific location – French real-estate agents continued to lie about everything else! This sparked an effort to provide reliable information to the buyer, and now an independent evaluation of the housing is mandatory before purchase. Today, the complete inspection list includes:
Each of these inspection requirements was created from some historical reference, the most recent of which being that for electricity. In 2007, two old and decaying buildings in Paris burned to the ground in a fire that killed many people, including several children. Since the cause was electric, it was an indication that too many installations were defective and needed to be checked.
Now there is a limit to the protection of the buyer: the law requires that this information be released, not that any problems be fixed. And so it is that most Parisian apartments still have traces of lead paint in them. But since the lead paint is usually covered in several coats of paint and wallpaper, it is not accessible except in very poorly maintained lodgings.
A recent incident showed me that French real-estate agents have not learned much in the area of customer satisfaction over the last two decades.
In February, one of my clients faced an interesting situation that demonstrates most of the issues mentioned above. She made an offer to buy an apartment after having been reassured by the realtor (who works for the French branch of a well-known American real-estate company) that the apartment was perfect and no work was needed. She could move in the next day without changing anything more than the carpet. She insisted on receiving information on the condition of the apartment several times, and was reassured each time that both the plumbing and the electrical systems were in excellent condition. So she made an offer based on this information. The notaire then asked for the reports of all the above-mentioned inspections, and the electrical system failed. It did not pass five out of the ten tests. My client was furious about being totally misled. If she had known this, she would not have offered so much money, and perhaps would not have made an offer on the apartment at all, considering the nightmare it is to conduct renovation work in Paris when one is living on the West Coast!
It is important to note here that my client had intended this apartment to be a rental property, and a tenant has the same right to know about the condition of an apartment as a buyer. In this case, my client would have had to provide this information to interested renters and hope it would not drive away potential tenants.
Up to the very end of the negotiation, the agency claimed that there was nothing “really” wrong with the apartment, including the electricity, and thus my client or any tenant could live in the apartment without risk.
The only way to avoid this kind of situation is to have the property inspected before making an offer, or to draft the offer in such a way that if the information provided at the time of the offer is false, the buyer has the option to walk away or decrease the purchase price. At first glance the second solution may seem best, but, considering the pressure real-estate agencies are putting on both buyers and sellers to secure a transaction, I advise people to have a French professional evaluate the property beforehand. Maybe one day it will be possible to make an offer with waivers, as in the case of American transactions, where regular procedure dictates that the offer is pending inspection results. Again in the USA, the waivers are provisions that put a condition in the agreement and a consequence is defined if something happens or does not happen depending on its drafting. This would mean that the buyer making the offer and, once the inspection was done, both parties would negotiate the deal based on the results. If things needed to be fixed, the owner could fix them or the buyer could agree to fix them and negotiate a lower price, or walk away. It could be a grueling process, but in the end nothing would be left unsaid and the buyer would take full responsibility for the property. The key difference here is that in France the individual buys the property “as is,” en l’état, without room to negotiate the price of the repairs or the complete renovation. The offer made is assumed to have taken into consideration all the existing defects important to the buyer.
A DISPUTE WITH THE ELECTRICAL UTILITY COMPANY (EDF)
It started as a nightmare. My client bought an apartment over two years ago and has been renting it out ever since. About a month ago, the EDF meter was read and the related bill was almost 9,000 euros, even though my client had been paying an estimated amount ranging from 80 to 140 euros every other month. So our first suspicion was that the meter was faulty, which is very hard to prove considering the fact that EDF stands by its machines and believes their products cannot go wrong!
The EDF employee came to inspect the meter while we were on the phone with headquarters. He discovered that there had been a sudden increase of 80,000 Kw/H since the last reading was done, 18 months before. We did not get the entire explanation for this, but after the employee had talked with headquarters, and after the account of the previous tenant had been verified, it was discovered that the last reading before the sale showed the 8 of the 80,000 while the first reading done since my client owned the apartment showed this 8 had disappeared from the records. So it went from 81.649,28 to 1.723,41 when my client got it and the most recent reading showed 89.942,91. Do not ask me how this could be possible, but thanks to EDF’s thorough archive system, the mystery was solved right then. Indeed, the employee at headquarters looked also at the records of the previous owner and saw how the mistake occurred.
I had never encountered such an odd situation, since EDF normally performs two readings a year, one during the first quarter and one six months later. EDF insists that their employees enter a property a minimum of once a year. When they cannot, they wait sometimes a couple of years or more before sending registered letters demanding access to the apartment, and can even take coercive measures to gain it.
Best regards,
Q & A
CONDITIONS TO BE BORN FRENCH
QUESTIONI have always believed that I was born French of a French mother who was born and raised in France. Recently I contacted the French consulate and asked what I should do to get my French passport. After hearing when and where I was born (in the late 1950s in the USA), they stated that there was no way I could be French. This is devastating news for me. Can you shed some light on this?
ANSWER
With so little information, it is extremely difficult to give a solid answer. This said, the French civil code is crystal clear: one is born French of a French parent. Here, nationality is conferred by le droit du sang, which can be translated as “the right by blood,” meaning that the French nationality is passed through a blood relation. French nationality has been granted in this way for ages. In contrast, today France places little weight on being born in France, or le droit du sol (“the right by soil”), which grants nationality according to the location of birth.
Therefore, the only way you can be French today is to have been born French and to not have done anything to lose your French nationality.
The essential question then becomes:
“Was your mother French when you were born?”
Let me review the various ways your mother could have lost her French nationality before the time of your birth. If just one of these situations applies to you, then the French consulate is correct and you were not born French. If, however, you fit none of them, then you were born French and should challenge the French consulate’s evaluation of your situation.
1 – BEING BORN FRENCH OF A FRENCH PARENT
Your mother’s French nationality must have been clearly documented somehow, and therefore I believe that, considering the fact that she was born in France (and probably of French parents), her birth nationality does not raise any issues.
a) Did she leave France as a minor?
If she left France before the age of 21 (the age for becoming an adult in France at that time), it was as a minor, which would possibly mean that she did not have bonafided French nationality, and therefore could not have passed it on to you.
b) Did she lose French nationality when she got married?
The second possibility is that when she got married, your mother lost her French nationality. In those days, very few children were born out of wedlock, so I assume that your parents were married when you were born.
In the 1950s it was quite difficult for women to obtain double nationality. Indeed, many countries would require that the wife take her husband’s nationality and by so doing relinquish her French nationality. In order to have any chance at keeping it, she would have to submit a special registration with the French consulate indicating that she had no intention of losing her French nationality. The vast majority never did this. Thus you need to check if she became American by marrying your father.
c) Did she lose French nationality when she was naturalized as an American citizen?
The third possibility is that she became a naturalized American (and therefore lost her French nationality) before you were born (unless there was special registration with the French consulate, as mentioned above).
So the essential question to investigate here is whether or not you were born before your mother became American. If the answer is YES, then it is clear that you were born French. If the answer is NO, then it is quite probable that you were not born French.
2 – PROVING THAT YOU WERE BORN FRENCH
The following documents are required to prove your status:
Since the French administration is very demanding about the quantity and quality of proof, it is quite possible that your request will be denied due to inconclusive or insufficient evidence. In fact, one of the major problems you will face is gathering proof of events that occurred in France between the 1930s and ‘50s – not only a distant period, but also a time of war!
As you can see, the French consulate’s statement that there is no way you could be French is possibly accurate, especially when we take into account how immigration law operated at the time.
However, if you wish to continue this project, you need to do a lot of preparatory work, which includes drawing up a kind of “business/strategy plan” to make the task more manageable.
Again, always keep in mind the importance of adequate proof. Even when it is evident that one qualifies for something, nothing is guaranteed without sufficient proof. Many lawsuits have been fought and lost in this way.
COLLECTING UNEMPLOYMENT BENEFITS AS A CARTE DE SEJOUR HOLDER
QUESTIONI am an American, and this past fall, I lost my job with a French employer after holding it for four years. When I went to ASSEDIC to register, I was told that I was not entitled to any benefit because of the nature of my residency status. How can I get these unemployment subsidies? And how does this situation affect the renewal of my carte de séjour? I have an appointment with the préfecture in one month and they want me to show my last three pay slips, which I of course do not have. An American friend of mine was terminated by ASSEDIC for no apparent reason; she was simply told that she was lazy. So is it worth fighting to register and get benefits if the system is set up to discriminate against foreigners?
ANSWER
I am truly sorry that you have been denied your right to receive unemployment benefits from ASSEDIC simply because the civil servant was not thorough enough in his review of your situation. A foreigner holding a carte de séjour salarié is entitled to registration with ASSEDIC and unemployment subsidies. The source of your ordeal is most likely the way the guidelines for this situation are drafted, which begin with the statement that “no carte de séjour holder is entitled to unemployment benefits except in the following cases…” Therefore it is essential that you go back to ASSEDIC with someone in order to verify that the person in charge of your request reads the provision completely! As you can see, discrimination against foreigners is not the real issue here.
By the way, you should receive about 70% of your net salary for a maximum of two years.
Now this ASSEDIC documentation is essential for renewal of your current carte de séjour. Indeed, the logic behind the requirement for proof of employment for a carte de séjour salarié is that the foreigner lives in France because he has a job here, so if he no longer has a job, why should he stay here? As we all know, this is actually false logic, as many foreigners would prefer to find another job in France than return to their home country, especially if, like you, they have been living here for several years. The first time you renew your carte de séjour at the prefecture while unemployed, you should acquire it quite easily. This is what I call “the right to play the joker once.” Of course, this outcome is possible only if you have been dismissed and are receiving unemployment subsidies. If you had quit your job, you could not have received unemployment and therefore could not renew your carte de séjour. You can now better understand how crucial it is that you register with this organization and start collecting unemployment. There is no stigma attached to this in France. So YES, it is worth fighting to get both the money and the right to stay in France.
As for your friend, I believe her predicament is the result of a gross cultural misunderstanding rather than of discrimination. I have no problem picturing what happened during the meeting. Indeed ASSEDIC/ANPE (now called le POLE EMPLOI) wants to monitor the individual’s efforts to find work quickly. The traditional French way to prove this effort is to cut out classified ads and attach them to a sheet of paper, on which the applicant when writes notes relating the efforts made; he then attaches it to the copy of the application letter sent. The civil servant then looks at how many classified ads were chosen, how many letters were sent out, and how many negative answers were received. Then during the meeting, one explains the number of interviews obtained and how they went. Nowadays, thanks to e-mail and websites, it is possible to send out applications without using the post, and thus keeping a job-search record is becoming increasingly difficult. Also, while some of the online chats on job-search websites are very valuable, they leave no trace that can be proved to a third party. So I can imagine your friend went to the meeting basically empty-handed, thinking she could explain how she went about looking for work using all kinds of networks and referrals. The civil servant, on the other hand, expected a thick file of documents proving the efforts, and was not convinced by her explanation (her level of French may have had something to do with this). In the end the civil servant basically had no proof and no believable story, and so denied your friend the registration and subsidies.
In your own efforts, then, you should print out all traces of your job search: e-mails, messages left on websites, etc., and organize them the old-fashioned way. This allows you to not only produce substantial evidence, but, even more importantly, to demonstrate the coherence of your job search. I would also advise that you take your agenda to the meeting so you can prove the appointments you had with potential employers and referrals. To be sure, reviewing your agenda and explaining each meeting is a powerful tactic, even without supporting documents.
By the way, this is just one illustration of how the French administration’s efforts to become paperless backfire, as the same administration demands paper documents to prove every situation!
Finally, I hope that I was able to explain that discrimination against foreigners does not play a part in any of this. However, it is also clear that as a foreigner you need to conform to the civil servants’ rules and expectations. If you do challenge them, make sure it is in such a way that you do not aggravate them and ruin your chances of solving the problem.
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