Feasability of Winter letting

[katiebythesea]

Hello, this looks like a really useful and supportive forum and I am really glad I have found it
I am just putting together plans for running gites in the Pyrenees Orientale area of the Languadoc, we are building 2 villas with swimming pools and renovating 2 old properties all in the Prades area between the ski-ing in Font Romeu and the beaches.
The question I have at the moment is how likely are we to get bookings in the winter months? It is a 40 min drive to the skiing and one of the older properties in in Molitg - les Bains which I think will attract french people having treatments in the baths.
Is anyone out there in thie region?
It is such a beautiful area and there is loads on offer to tourists apart from ski-ing/beaches.
Looking forward to talking more
Katie

[Moon Dog]

Hi Katie,

Our house is in the PO and we would love to be there now…

Sounds like you have great plans afoot and your business model will no doubt be refined as you go. We are definitely out of range of the ski resorts and so found winter lettings hard. I suspect that most skiers want to be ten mins or so from the slopes and the bars so places like Font Romeu are better placed for that market. Having said that, I’m not a skier myself (yet!) so it would be well worth waling into the Prades tourist office on a quiet afternoon and seeing if you can pick their brains about the local market.

We have found that having longer lets over the winter has really worked for us. It does carry some risks, which have been fully discussed in other threads if you want to have a dig around.

Bonne courage!

[cuica]

I manage a few properties near the sea in Greece, where holidays are traditionally summer affairs, and I've been suprised to get winter bookings...

Just the other day I received an enquiry for all of December!

If you are near to a ski resort and you sell your property on that I expect you will get interest, although of course I'm not familiar with yiur area...