I've recently done a wire transfer and found it very costly.

My bank, obviously in business to make money, charged an exchange rate about $.05 higher than the XE.com rate and there was a $40 charge just to do the wire transfer. The French bank also charged a fee (20 euros) to accept the transfer.

The apartment that we're renting is a great deal so I just factored the extra fees in as part of the rent. It is certainly not the cheapest way to pay for anything, however.

I already posted this on another thread about Paris apartments, but this Australian website has lots of choices with everything in English and full contact details of the owners. http://www.holidaystoeurope.com.au
Like you, I would feel much more secure knowing what I'm signing!!

Contract signed. Deposit wired. It was $35 with BoA. The exchange rate was a little better than Wells Fargo.

I am keeping my fingers crossed.

It isn't that hard to get a contract translated. Just call a translation service. You'll have to pay for it but would you sign a contract written in English that you didn't read? If you don't speak the language the contract is written in, it's the same thing.

Another reason that prices for the same property can vary across websites is that they represent different amounts of agency fees and markup. It is not unheard of for a property to be listed by multiple agencies/services, all of whom price as they see fit. I learned this a couple years back when I responded to a posting made by a Parisian owner herself, and also saw the place on other sites at different rates. When I asked about this, she told me that there are places (somewhat like apartment rental agencies in the US) who work strictly on commission and set their own prices.

Seems like if the web site is in English, and it is in Paris, after all, no doubt at least a significant percentage of the renters are English speakers, seems like it would be standard to have an English version of the contract available.

It does appear to be a lovely apartment. Please let us know how it worked out.

you also have these paris apartments :
http://www.rentapart.com/

Regards

You may want to try www.myvideoplanet.com , too: they have videos of the apartments, nice to have a look before

elyang - Have you returned from this trip yet? I'm renting this same apartment later this year and was wondering what your thoughts of it were.