Find a long term rental studio in Paris
 

Hi,

I will be studying 10 months in Paris. Tried to find a furnished studio with some real estate agencies, but they are incredibly expensive, charging 2 months of rent as up-front fees.
Then someone pointed me to http://www.pap.fr, but it is all in French and I do not speak it (yet), the landlords do not reply or say they selected another person. Does anyone know a site where they want to help foreigners in Paris with cheaper fees ?

Thanks,
Carla

Perhaps your school has a housing office that can help?

Yes - get assistance from your school . . . but >>but they are incredibly expensive<< . . . what sorts of rent have you found? They might not be all that expensive for Paris. Also where is your school located?

Agree to try the university housing office. Perhaps they offer shares in apts (in the US this is very common - 2 people in a studio or 3/4 people in a one bedroom - having one's own apt is a luxury).

Don't see why anyone in Paris would want to reduce their prices for non-residents. What would be their rationale?

And it would help if you provided details - you budget may not be realistic.

I think you may have unrealistic expectations. If you think the rentals on pap.fr are too much, you probably just don't understand that Paris is a very expensive city and short-term rentals are going to cost you a lot. Nobody wants to help foreigners with cheap fees, so forget that. Why should they, they aren't charities. The school's housing office is the best idea, maybe you should forget an apt and stay in a student residence, those are very cheap can be nice enough. I've stayed in them, and it's convenient and a good way to meet others. Are you in a real university? I know they have them.

The problem is you want a cheap apt for locals but then want the website to be in English. For another website like pap, try www.lodgis.fr They do have multilingual agents who can help you if you call. The cheapest furnished place I saw on there was about 700 euro a month and it was nothing great (I only searched Left Bank). Here's an example of one near COmmerce metro (a good location) for about 800 month, a 15m2 basic studio (the owner speaks English).
http://www.lodgis.com/fr/paris,locat...is-15.mod.html

They do require one month's rent as agency fee if you rent longer than 3 months (and I don't think you see that in the rates for long-term rentals, only short term ones). SO that's close to 100 euro a month for the fee. For 10 months, that's exactly 10 pct. But you aren't going to find places that cheap on regular vacation apt websites, that's still only going to be 900-1000 euro a month. They also want 2 months rent deposit, however, so maybe that's the norm.

I really think you should consider staying in a student residency or foyer (student rooming house) for what you want -- no deposit, cheap, short-term. Any apt rental will want a big deposit.

Here is a website on student accommodation and foyers
http://www.etudiantdeparis.fr/node/116

Here is a list of foyers in Paris which are NOT run by the official student housing agency (CROUS, which is near the RER Port ROyal). You can get rooms for about 400-700 a month. They show the criteria (age, sex, etc).

http://www.crous-paris.fr/UploadFile...ste_foyers.pdf

Here is an example, right across from Luxembourg Gardens, a good location. A friend of mine stayed there and said it was okay.
http://www.fie.fr/francais/presentation.html

Now they only have two sessions, people there for the entire school year, or the summer. It isn't clear to me when your 10 months is. If it's a year from now so next school year, okay. If it begins in a couple weeks, that may be okay (but foyers may likely be filled). If it is a weird 10 months out of sync with school, you may really have problems (ie, if it is January 2015 until Oct 2015). Then a private rental may work better.

<i>I think you may have unrealistic expectations</i>

I´ll agree with that statement. Paris is not inexpensive and if you do not speak French, as in now not later, your search is greatly complicated. As an unknown, someone without a rental history, no bank account, and no previous account with the EDF, renting anything will not be easy at any price.

www.pap.fr is one of the lowest cost options for finding accommodations. You might also try:

http://www.leboncoin.fr/
http://www.seloger.com/
http://www.limmobilierdesparticuliers.com/
http://www.orpi.com/

What school? What area would you prefer for your apartment?
Any agency will expect a fee. You might try looking at sites like homeaway.com , vrbo.com or even airbnb as some of the properties accept long term renters. Even if a post dors nto specifically say so, it does not hurt to ask.

My niece stayed in the studio www.vrbo.com/311242 for a few months while studying in Paris and liked it. I don't recall the exact rate but it was quite reasonable for the property and location.

Hi All,

Thanks a lot for all your links! I checked them out and some more as well. In the end a friend from university, who is also foreigner, pointed me to a site where she found her apartment: http://www.paris-start.com
They really charged a lot less for their help than then typical real estate agencies in the streets do and helped me with translations to French as well.
Just signed the contract for my small(!) but beautiful studio... :)

Carla.

Thank you for coming back to tell us how it went, and also thank you for the link. It may be very valuable to other Fodorites who are looking for longer term leases. Do you mind providing a link to your place and/or what rate you ended up paying?

I'm glad it turned out well. Student housing is a giant problem in Paris, even though the city is making huge efforts to build new housing for them. In my own area, about half of the things being built are for university housing.

hi, my university is the Sorbonne. I ended up paying 720 euros per month, electricity not included. They removed the apartment already from the site, so i should upload pictures myself, i will take some soon. But besides the deposit for the landlord, which is 1 month rent, the agency only charged me about 20 euros and that's it. That is a huge difference with what they proposed me in some rental agencies that are located in the streets of Paris around the university...well internet is great, what can i say otherwise ;) Paris is great as well though ;);)