Estimating the total cost of your property purchase

When you sign the contract of sale, your notaire will ask you to lodge a deposit in respect of legal fees. Legal fees are lower when you buy a new-build, accounting for between 3% and 4% of the price of the property.
Legal fees are broken down into 3 items:

• the fees of the notaire and his/her staff: these fees are fixed by law and are the same for all notaires,

• the duties and taxes the notaire is responsible for collecting,

• costs and disbursements: i.e. all the costs incurred by the notaire in handling your case.

A few months after signing the contract of sale, the notaire will send you the supporting documentation explaining the costs incurred. If the balance of the account is in your favour, he or she will pay you the amount due, or where the opposite is the case, request payment of the difference where the costs have not been covered in full by the original deposit.

These are the guarantees and insurances you enter into when you take out a mortgage:

• your loan guarantee: you have the choice of a mortgage secured against the property or a guarantee bond, which is usually granted by a specialist or mutual company,

• death and disability insurance, which is obligatory,

• unemployment insurance, which is optional.

Contact your bank and compare the insurance rates on offer, as you would with mortgage rates.

Between the time when you sign the contract of purchase with your notaire and the moment when your Bouygues Immobilier advisor hands you the keys to your new property, you will have to pay:

• preliminary interest: you pay for your property in several stages. At each stage, your bank releases a part of the amount borrowed, but you don’t begin to repay this capital until the full price has been paid and you have taken possession of the property. Until that time, you pay only “preliminary” interest (intérêts intercalaires in French),

• rent on your previous home, where obliged to do so during this period,

• removal costs, if you need to rent a vehicle or use a removals firm.

Tip: draw up a payments schedule to help you plan how all these costs will be met. Not all of them will need to be paid at the same time, so drawing up this reminder should help make sure that you don’t forget anything!