I thought it might be useful to explain how expats in France make ends meet. Just possibly this will give you an idea of how you could earn money as an expat and enable you to make the big leap yourself.
I am not concerned here with expats who work in France as an employee of an international company and just happen to be based in France for a couple of years, but with those of us who have to scrape together our own income just using our wits. I have also ignored criminal activities although I believe they can be quite lucrative.
I will also ignore retired folk who receive a pension and people who have sold businesses elsewhere, and can afford to sit around in the sunshine sipping wine for the rest of their natural lives. Finally I have ignored those who have no plan, and choose to slide gently into poverty until they are forced to return to where they came from.
The following are all jobs and businesses run by people we know working in rural France:
- Running gites and bed and breakfast – yes, this can still work well if you do a good job, and have the initial funds to set-up an attractive environment
- European Sales representative for a pharmaceutical comapny
- Website Designer and website publishing, or professional blogging
- Audio-editing
- Tree-felling and ground clearance
- Builers, plumbers etc
- International DJ
- Freelance graphics designer
- Swimming pool maintenance or general gardening – typically for other retired expats
- Maintaining second homes for foreign owners – keeping an eye on properties for absentee owners
- Estate agency (usually involves teaming up with a French estate agent, since it is difficult for an expat to obtain the correct licence)
- English shops / importers – bringing in the staples of a foreign diet – baked beans, marmite, Indian spices etc, and reselling them to the expat community
You can see that expat work in France falls into two broad types – earning money by working in the local economy (eg gardening, gites), and earning from jobs that could be based anywhere (eg internet based and freelance jobs).
Of course, some of these earn more money than others, but all can generate a sufficient income for expats putting in the time and effort to do a good job. Word gets around pretty fast if you are reliable, honest and good-value. I am not aware of any expats also paying a French mortgage from their income. This would make the challenges significantly greater.
Note that there are official registration requirements for most businesses, that your local Chamber of Commerce will be able to help you with. Remember, it can be expensive to start a business in France! I am NOT recommending you work illegally.
I’m sure that across France there are expats doing hundreds of other jobs, but hopefully this gives you some ideas. The paradox is that many of the jobs involve making money from other expats, and it is difficult to see the options available until you live here yourself.
Happy expatriations!
This is an excellent article. I will add you to our expatriate website, I think this is the best French Expat Blog I have read through in a long time. I hope you keep it going and all the French Expats find your thoughts and advice useful.
What are the EU rules concerning moving to another EU country. Isn’t one supposed to have a job, or some source of income within 3 months of leaving one’s country.
Im a mechanic in England looking to move to France.
Could I make a living serving the british community ?
This would not be our main income but hopfully it could help to ease the burden !
Hi Brian,
Do you mean car mechanic? Or small machinery perhaps?
I don’t think it would be easy to compete as a car mechanic – most of the British community take their cars to the local garage for servicing (every town has a garage or three), and I’m not sure that you could undercut them on price.
For small machinery I’d be more optimistic – our local garages always seem very expensive for repairs and servicing of small equipment – chainsaws, lawnmowers etc and I think there is perhaps a niche there waiting to be exploited – maybe more so when people will prefer to repair things than replace them.
But in truth I know little of the business or the demand for it, so am only speculating…
Hi Boris,
I’m considering moving to France within the next couple of years, I’m already a qualified electrician & I will have completed a course in installing photovoltaic solar panels(for producing your own electricity). Do you know if this is a viable industry in France, have many people installed solar panels? Do you know of any companies possibly?!?
Hi Paul, I believe it’s a booming industry in France, we get a lot of companies promoting the idea to us, but I’m not sure how it would work for an expat – at the moment the government (through EDF) encourage people to have these and subsidise them through special schemes, grants, low interest loans and high buy-pack prices for the electricity produced. I don’t know all the details but I understand they guarantee that you won’t ever be left out of pocket, and should make a residual income each month (perhaps only after a few years?)
All well and good but I think the installation companies need to be EDF approved to be able to offer all the grants etc. So the answer is perhaps – if you could get approved and market the scheme to expats it could well work out quite well, but if you couldn’t get approved and offer the same terms I have no idea whether the numbers would work out for people or it would be profitable (doubtless the edf approved companies are charging twice as much as they need to…)
On balance, sounds like a good idea but needing research first to be sure.
Hi,
Great list, my wife and I run around 4 different types of business altogether some of which you have listed. Website design, running a gite, soft furnishings with reupholstery plus I also do Internet marketing. But you are right, they do fit into your broad categories.
You are also right about the mortgage, we don’t have one here.
Don’t know how I forgot internet marketing…
I also notice architect / surveyor type jobs aren’t on the list, also one or two of our local market traders are English and seem to do OK selling their own home-made produce. Another possibility for the bilingual which is quite popular is helping those who don’t speak French very well to deal with solicitors and other bureaucratic matters.
Hi
very interesting, just starting too look into this. I am an IT consultant and have built 1,000s of PCs etc. I was told a couple of years ago that there is a real shortage of English speaking IT experts in France who can look after the Expats computers. Is this the case. It cant be easy for a non English speaking person to repair a corrupted Windows.
Hi Steve, Yes I think there is a shortage of people able to look after expat computers – I get asked from time to time if I can do it because people know I work with computers (I can’t, I don’t know about hardware, windows, viruses etc) and I am also often asked if I know anyone who can do it. I also get asked by local French people, so learning how to deal with French versions of software etc would also make sense…and as for my friend with a Dutch version Apple Mac they can never find anyone at all!
I really enjoyed the article! We do have a French mortgage, I am American and my partner is Dutch, and we work from the computer just as we did in Holland. However, there are many more costs now that we have a home rather than rent, and we need to fix it up, so thanks for the tips! You can also add babysitting perhaps or nannying for ladies. I am a good cook and will try to see if I can find something wherein I can babysit and then cook dinner for the family afterwards.
Hi Boris, I am really happy to have come across this great blog.
I am Bolivian, I did work for many years in the electronic industry, as an Eng Tech. and all the way to test and them design Eng. in the Silicon Valley, California. I do speak fluent English, German and of course my native tongue Spanish. French, I can read but very weak on speaking and writing.
I just started getting my retirement pension in the US, which is not that much. so I can not afford to sit on a patio sipping French wine all day long, besides I just feel doing nothing.
I do feel just as energetic as when I as 30 years old, have said that, I need to ask you: what I could do to earn enough money to get by in France?, I will be spending every Summer (4 months) there. Thanks
Hi José, thanks for stopping by! It’s not easy making money in France, your best chance is to see what needs there are wherever you live and that your skills can deal with – anything from painting and decorating to freelance writing or website design according to your knowledge. Depending where you will be there might be a need for people in the tourist industry during the summer as you have good language skills (our daughter works in a theme park because they like to have staff who can speak to customes from all over the place). But there is a lot of luck in being at the right place at the right time…!
Hi Boris, thanks for your quick reply.
A correction on my previous post: ¨… besides I will just feel BORE doing nothing.¨
I love Paris, already 3x in short vacation there. This time I would like to stay in a different place, maybe Toulouse, I hear it is one of the cheapest places to live in France. My main objective is to learn French, the second consideration is budget (It allows for one month and a half, unless I can supplement it with some kind of a little income).
As I said in my previous post, I have electronic skills, also very proficient with computers (hardware and software), no so with web design of sorts.
Language: Your theme park tip is a good one, the only problem, that may come up, with this kind of employer, is a demand for a work_permit papers. So, I will have to look for gigs or short jobs, one at the time, because I will be entering the country as a tourist with no rights to take a job. Once there I will try to explore changes of becoming a ¨permanent resident¨ ala USA.
I will appreciate suggestions on towns and places to reside in France with considerations on cost of living AND Adult Education Schools which offer French classes
Thanks again.
Unfortunately I don’t know the cheapest towns in France to live – large towns are all quite expensive nowadays! Most big towns will have somewhere to learn French, many towns have free classes to help foreigners integrate.
Lots of French people work ‘cash in hand’ and presumably plenty of foreigners work without permits or the necessary permissions but that isn’t something I know about personally…to find work straightaway will be pretty tough in those circumstances I think.