Buying a chalet in Saint-Gervais: why we bought land instead
We spent years looking at chalets in Saint-Gervais. Then we did the sums and bought a plot instead.
By Marc 3 min read
The search begins
We’ve been inside dozens of chalets in Saint-Gervais. We’ve walked round more building plots than we can count, and spent more evenings on property websites than we’d like to admit.
Saint-Gervais was always the place. It’s a proper town that’s busy all year, at the foot of Mont Blanc. In winter you’re on the Évasion Mont-Blanc ski area, with around 445 km of pistes. In summer it’s road cycling, mountain biking and some very good walks.
The hard part was never choosing the town. It was choosing what to buy in it.
Chalet or plot?
Finding the right chalet for sale in Saint-Gervais-les-Bains was harder than we expected. On every visit we’d end up outside the windows of the immobiliers (estate agents) in the village. Back home, we’d scroll the listing portals. Plenty looked lovely. Very few felt right.
Slowly we came round to a different idea: buy land and build. Three things pushed us that way.
- What it costs to buy.
- What it costs to run.
- How much say you get over how it looks.
The price you see isn’t the price you pay
When you buy property in France, the asking price is only the start. On top comes what everyone calls frais de notaire (notaire fees), most of which is actually tax. On an older chalet, or on land bought from a private seller, budget roughly 7–8% of the price. That can blow the budget you set while gazing through the agents’ windows.
One small mercy: in our experience in Saint-Gervais, the seller paid the estate agent’s fee, so we didn’t have to add that on. It’s worth checking on every listing.
Buying land, you still pay those fees at much the same rate. But it’s a percentage of a much smaller number. The real question is whether you can build new for less than it costs to buy old. We’ll tell you when the chalet’s finished (and the last invoice has been paid).
We go through the buying process properly in a later chapter: the offer, the compromis and the notaire. This is our experience, not legal or tax advice.
Running costs
Look at the energy certificates on older chalets (the French DPE, rated A to G) and very few score well. Even fairly new concrete chalets rarely get an A.
Electricity in France is cheaper than in the UK. But Saint-Gervais is in the Alps, and it does get cold up there (who knew). Over the years, heating a chalet in winter and cooling it in summer adds up.
Building new meant we could make the chalet far more efficient, and so cheaper to run, than anything we’d viewed. It’s a big part of why we chose to build with insulated panels, which we explain in the chapter on choosing a builder.
Getting the look you want
Finally, the look of the place. When you build something new yourself, you can design it exactly how you want.
That was the idea, anyway. In Saint-Gervais the mairie (town hall) has rather firm views of its own about what a chalet should look like. We tell that story in the planning chapter.
A little context
Is it cheaper to buy land or a chalet in Saint-Gervais?
The buying costs are lower on land, because the fees are a percentage of a smaller price. Whether the whole project ends up cheaper depends on what the build costs, and we’ll share how ours came out once it’s finished.
How much are buying costs on a property in France?
For an older home, or land from a private seller, budget roughly 7–8% of the price on top, most of it government tax rather than the notaire’s own fee. Buying new from a VAT-registered developer can bring that down to around 2–3%. This is our experience, not advice.
Who pays the estate agent’s fee in Saint-Gervais?
In our experience the seller paid it, so it wasn’t added to our costs. Check each listing, though, as it can vary.
Why are older chalets expensive to heat?
Many older chalets score poorly on France’s energy certificate (the DPE, rated A to G), and even fairly new concrete ones rarely reach an A. In a cold Alpine winter, that shows up on the bills.
How big is the ski area at Saint-Gervais?
Saint-Gervais is part of the Évasion Mont-Blanc ski area, with around 445 km of pistes shared with Megève, Combloux, Saint-Nicolas-de-Véroce and Les Contamines.
