The buying process - our experience

So ... hopefully I have gained enough interest to warrant a 'how to' explaination so I shall endeavour to explain our experience of buying a property here in CZ. This will not be a definitive guide but as there are others out there more qualified than I to guide you through but here goes ...

1) First you need a will, and where there's a will there is always a way ...

2) You need to have friends who are Czech .... seriously, I believe if you were doing this cold you would have problems with the language and interpretation.

3) Decide where you want to be first by visiting and spending time here ... step off the beaten track and really explore ..

4) Employ somebody who 'knows' ... it makes such a difference especially when it comes to identifying things like covenants in contracts and title deeds.

So, what did we do ? ... well, our friend 'H', who I can highly recommend offers such a service, (this is not a plug by the way but to be honest we could not have done it without her and where she didn't know she would soon find out) .. see http://www.czechpropertysearch.co.uk/ which is her website. Her help was actually offered before she set up this service and amongst others we encouraged her to do it as she just does it so well. So, as I was saying .... the first thing you need BEFORE you can buy property in CZ is residency which must be obtained from the Foreign Police Office. So how can you get residency when you cannot buy I here you ask ?? .. well what we did was 'rent' a room with another expat who had already gone through this same process and demonstrated this by having a contract so that this gave us a mailing address. We explained via 'H' who acted as our interpreter that we wanted to live in Cesky Krumlov to learn to speak Czech as well as learn about Czech culture and the arts. The Foreign Police are used to this and I am sure are aware that this is a way to buy property. There is nothing illegal in this, it is just an acceptable way for expats to get a residency stamp. To note the Czech authorities are very keen on dispelling any doubts of corruption which was ever present during the communist era. If you know how things are done properly then you will be fine. This is after all Central Europe and CZ is in the EU. Once you are armed with your 'residency' you can then place an offer on a property via an agent who, like the UK acts on behalf of the persons selling the property. They do however differ slightly in that they handle the contract side of things and they will prepare a 'holding' contract where you will pay a deposit to them ..., this initial contract MUST be checked before you sign and updated as necessary to read that the agent agrees to agree no sale to anyone else as they can continue to market and agree a sale to another party depending on the way this contract is worded. You also have to be mindful that you could potentially lose your deposit so you have to check that the contract includes the return of all fees in the event of a no sale on the agents part. We kind of ran out of time when doing this so I would recommend that you give yourself plenty of time to house hunt, make an offer and sign the holding contract, at least 10 days in country.

The process now starts and a further 'purchasing' contract will be prepared by the agent which you will again need to sign and this must be done in front of a notary, again appointed by the agent. You must obtain a draft copy and have this checked to ensure that there are no covenants etc. that may effect you as being sole owner before signing. It is at this time that all necessary documentation, residency and czech bank account etc. must be available. You will also pay the agreed purchase price, (less deposit) to the agent who will pay this to an official who holds the money until the purchase is agreed and rights transferred via the land registry, (katastry office). Be aware that there will be charges for this made by the lawyer who acts on behalf of both parties and will pay X amount to the agent, x amount to the seller or amounts to each family member. In our experience the agent omitted to tell us about the additional lawyers charge and although not much we had to pay the extra to ensure the sale went through. You will be given a registry number and you must then wait approx 4 wks for the registration. As it was the Katastry office in Krumlov are very good and exact and they highlighted a potential error in the English / Czech translation of the contract which required additional amendments to be drawn up. This then ensured that we were 100% owners of all of the property as detailed with the land registry. Unfortunately this caused further delays and return trips ..., I think our sellers were quite embarrassed by it all and in fact allowed us to stay in the property whilst the sale was going through, (this is unheard of in the UK ??!!). Approx 2 and a bit months after we signed the initial contract we became the rightful owners of the house. Once this was done we then returned to the Foreign Police and had our residency stamps updated to show our new address. There were no fees paid for this.

To re-iterate, it makes so much sense to get help through this process with someone who knows the system. Be aware of hidden extras as well as charges that may be made to you. So I hope this helps .... but don't rely on me .. ask someone who knows and you could soon be the proud owners of a fantastic property.

Will mail again soon ... in actuality I typed this mail over 2 weeks ago but have been at sea so am on my way home to sort out lorries as I plan to ship some of our furniture over by doing a self drive ... I'll let you know how I get on .. tell then .,,, naschladonou .. Tim

Pics of the house ....

Here is a list of pics of the house ..... enjoy .... so you see .. it's certainly substantial, there's a bit of work to do especially with the damp and, yes its a large project ... but nothing that can't be achieved. The intention is to turn it into a family home ... with a few enhancements of course. (ahhhh .. thinks, maybe one day ... 'krumlov custom motorcycles' with some dance or acting classes thrown in ... mmmmm.. !).

So hope this has wetted your appetite .... you can kind of see what is available out here ... and yes they were my feet in the flooded cellar !!. I'll post some more soon as well as explaining about the buying process and what we plan to do etc. .... cau fur the noo, T

In the beginning .....

Hello all and Francois, (who offered my very first comment .. thank you) .... here commeth the next installment ... well not so much next but rather a start at the beginning so you all get an idea of what I'm on about .....

In the beginning ..... there was a family,.. our teenage son, Alistair .. a dog called Spike,.. a Miniature Pinscher and the wonderful girl who is my wife called Shelley. My name is Tim .. (these sometimes unwilling characters will appear in future blogs !! :-)).
'WE' i.e. Shelley and I have been coming to the Czech Rep for a while ... we have friends who you may or may not know from 'britblog', (see links on my page) ... anyway ... about 10yrs ago I befriended a chap, 'C' we'll call him who's partner was Czech and he was commuting to Prague / Cesky Krumlov. Myself, Shelley and Alistair visited Prague and met our now dearest friend 'H', ('C' s partner) and we fell in love with the country and its people from that point onwards. Unfortunately we 'lost contact' however as luck would have it I met up with 'C' at a heliport in Aberdeen in early 2007 which we both visit frequently to join our respective vessels and installations operating in the North Sea. We exchanged emails .. caught up with some gossip with a parting promise of visiting Cesky Krumlov in South Bohemia as soon as possible. Shelley and I went back to visit Krumlov several times after that, both driving and flying and over time our friends said, "look you keep coming here, why not think of buying somewhere?" .. so our friend 'H' who is an absolute goldmine when it comes to knowing how things work property wise in South Bohemia set about having a look for somewhere for us whilst we were back in UK. In the latter part of 2007 we had a final list of properties we wanted to look at which we had decided upon after several emails and arranged a visit to look to buy.
So you know, ... there are some wonderful properties in the Krumlov area ... we wanted something close to town but not on its doorstep which was substantial and we could turn in to a family home. Believe it our not we started with a 'hutkin' ... which is a small hut basically, usually made of concrete and timber and provides basic but comfortable living ... ideal for short stay holidays ... I really liked it as it overlooked Krumlov ... see view over Cesky Krumlov in first attached pic and you will see what I mean . This was good and a very reasonable price at about £12,000 but we had yet to see the rest. We had a list that included some that we had found whilst surfing the net as well as ones that 'H' had selected based on our brief. As it was the house we ended up choosing was one that both parties had picked ... so after seeing a few properties we eventually visited 'our house' ... Shelley went one way and I went the other... and when meeting back up our first words to each other were .... " I want this one !!". We both just knew that this was what we wanted. I can't really remember if we saw any more houses after that ... I think we did see at least one more that had been partly converted but it just wasn't the same. My wife has a better recollection of these things, suffice to say it was decision made.
I will look to post how to go about buying property in CZ in a separate post but so that you know its not overly complicated but YOU WILL need help. It is more of a language issue and translations of contract details of which ours was quite complicated and took a while as the property was split between several family members but in late 2007 the property was finally registered at the Katastry, (land registry office) as ours. At the time the exchange rate between the UK £ and Czech Kc was really good ... we paid around £70,000 and what a bargain ... trust me, you can't buy a flat in the UK for that.
I did the trek of a lifetime by riding my Triumph Bonneville the thousand or so miles in the wettest weather you have ever seen in Germany followed by a fantastic sunny ride through Austria and up into South Bohemia in the October to pick up the keys. The old owners were there to meet me, (we have all since become good friends with the old lady and her grandsons tending the garden whilst we are away) .. a bed had been made up ready as well as wood for the fire and a full set of verbal instructions on how to operate the solid fuel boiler, (still managed to burn myself on the flue despite telling the previous owner to be careful .. Duhhh !!). The house has been in the family for several generations .. it has been good to stay in close contact with our new neighbours and polite and I think proper to accept there generosity and helpfulness. They have been very good with helping us in our new way of life and very tolerant of my poor Czech .. but we are learning ... my answer to most things is "nerozumim, jsem ancklichan" .. which basically means "I don't understand, I am an Englishmen !!" .. but with the help of a very good dictionary and a spatter of German we get by.
If I were to describe the house I would say it is in a big square ... so basically take the front pic of the house and times it by 4 with the open courtyard in the middle. The front of the house is the main living part with the sides consisting of the old village hall, several garages and workshops, a large barn, a chicken coup, a potato store, an outdoor kitchen with solid brick floored upper floors, (vaulted ceilings below) and the top floor of the main house not livable but including a large pig smoker. The condition of this near 200yr old property is basically very sound with some damp problems with the inner and outer walls ... more than likely down to the unconsidered use of concrete internal floors and the house being unused for a few yrs. Nothing that cannot be remedied we think having experience with this is an old property we currently live in in the UK.
So here we are ... the whole thing took about 10yrs ... (with the actual house purchase taking about 3 mths in total) .... from first meeting 'C' and 'H', visiting Prague and then travelling south to Krumlov where we found our new home . My wife calls it the 'death house' ... what she means is the house we intend to live to a ripe old age in and leave in our sons inheritance ...sounds morbid but I now what she means ... somewhere to grow old together, in a beautiful country with very friendly people.
My next posts will look to show you more of the house as well as how to buy if your interested ... or even coming to visit ... when you get chance just Google Cesky Krumlov ....

CU soon ... Tx