Chalet Owners

A snowHead

Hello!

My girlfriend and I are interested in setting up a ski chalet business. We have done a combined 3 seasons and are on our way to have another but we realise that working for someone else is just not viable to build a future with. We've both worked in the UK and can safely say we much prefer the hard life of working in a Chalet but having the mountains and snow on our door step.

However, we have just begun doing some research and I honestly have no idea where to begin. I would like to hear from other people who have expierence in establishing a ski chalet business. Where did you begin?

If anyone can help us, either through a quick message/email or over some tea we would love to hear all the advice we can get.

Thanks in advance

A snowHead

Dave_N88, if you have no idea where to begin, can I suggest that trying it out by working for someone else for a season is a good place to start and gain experience? Property is expensive to buy or lease, and then there's all the bills, food etc etc. You don't have to work for a major tour operator, smaller outfits advertise for staff too.

Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?

speak to Ben Farley at Alpine Culture, i m sure he could help point you in the right direction.

www.alpineculture.com for contact details

You need to Login to know who's really who.

Buy or rent a property.

Give it a name.

Fill it with food, water, heat and bedding.

Pay insurance.

Place adverts online and offline.

Watch money go up in smoke.

Return embittered to home country a few years later.

Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.

Dave_N88, Welcome to snowHeads, this is a question asked before, have a fioddle around with the clonky old search facility on here, it does need a bit of button pressing until you get results you want!

You'll need to Register first of course.

Hells Bells, not sure if you read my full post but we have been doing just that for the past 2 years. I've obviously done the research for property we're looking to rent initially and we have a vague idea of where to start. Its more the paperwork side, taxes, etc that i have no idea where to get information from.

Stefoy4me thanks i will get in touch.

Whitegold, i read another of your posts where you slated seasonaires rending any post you put here or anywhere else in future null and void in my opinion.

Then you can post your own questions or snow reports...

Whitegold, how did you get ahold of my business plan?... 6 years and still going!
Dave_N88, there are a few threads in the 'chalets and appartments' bit of the forum... have a wee look...

After all it is free

Hells Bells, you might want to read the OP's post again.

You are starting a business and, like any other, you need to do the research and draw up a business plan. If you are used to budgeting for running a chalet for others I would say you are over 40% of the way there. If you are not - you don't say what type of work you were doing during your three seasons - you should do as 'Bells suggests (she is right, you don't want to jump into this unless you have done at least one season as joint chalet hosts). You need to suss out the relative costs of buying and renting a chalet, the returns expected (both pretty easy to work out) and a breakeven point based on 'buns in beds'. You need to calculate how much money you need to raise in order to start operations - probably a fair amount. You need to include a contingency, don’t be fooled into thinking everything will be perfect first time out. It might be, but then again …. Often this can be an agreed overdraft but I would not advise relying on that unless you have to.

If you have done all the above and it does not put you off then I suggest you start chatting with people. I am sure that you will get good advice but it can only be relative to the experience people have had and you are forward projecting in areas with some uncertainty. If you are planning to open up a four bed apartment in Flaine then the advice you need will be very different to the advice you would need for opening up a twenty bed mega chalet in, say, Andorra. If in doubt, consult a local lawyer about the required legal issues/permits/insurance. You do not want to start up only to be closed down immediately. It would probably be ideal if you were doing the joint season in the place that you intend to open your venture. Take the opportunity to learn as much as you can without telling anyone what you plan to do. Remember, you are going to move from being an employee to a competitor. There are very few people in business who would relish or assist in that transition and keeping as much local goodwill as you can is crucial.

This is prob. unnecessary but joint experience is crucial - you need to have done at least one season together as chalet hosts. Back in the day I had to cart my g/f across the alps to 'rescue/console' her friend whos relationship had collapsed mid-way through a season where she and her ex-still had to share a room in a chalet they hosting - not pretty.

Once the money/cost side of the equation is worked out then you need to start contacting people who will 'assist' you - a bank, a bookkeeper/accountant (unless you plan to do the accounts and tax payments yourselves), insurance broker/company, local suppliers (including services), etc. Once you have had those chats you should re-look at the finances and see if they still make sense.

This is a very, very brief summary. Successful businesses tend to be the ones which rely on good, industry specific preperation - get cracking on the numbers

Ah, after reading my first post and what Ratty had to say i will start again!

I am 24 years old, i've got a degree in Economics and spent 2 years working in the Finance industry. I've already had a business of my own (www.tickettext.co.uk) and have other expierences of establishing a business. I have finished 1 season working with my gf as Chalet Hosts in a 19-bed, 9 room Chalet in the Italian dolomites and will be doing a second as of this winter. We would IDEALLY be looking to open up in the same area but looking into rates of return I strongly believe that up and coming areas may prove to be higher sources of profit initially.

Obviously we are right at the beginning of our business plan but the reason why I posted is that at the moment I am finding it difficult to calculate initial costs as I can't seem to find information about the following things:

1) How much does it cost to rent a 5-7 bed LUXURY chalet for a) Winter Season b) Summer & Winter Season.
2) What costs are there related to registering the business in the UK?
3) What other costs are there related to running the Chalet in that particular country.
4) What sort of insurance am I looking for and how much does that cost?
5) Are there any other initial questions that I have not thought of, or any trials and tribulations others have had in the primary stages.

I've tried to google it all but have not found too much thats been helpful. I will spend the rest of the afternoon browsing through the forum but if anyone can help with those questions that would be great.

*Ski* the Net with snowHeads

This is an interesting thread, i'd also like to know the above information too.

I, Like the OP, looked into this about 15 years ago but gave up, as i couldn't find the desired information.

I think it helps if you can speak or understand either French, German or Italian, when doing research...if you get my drift.

snowHeads are a friendly bunch.

RattytheSnowRat, Embarassed

snow reports

I'm also extremely interested in this thread. I have an egg in the nest to pursue something along these lines after La Ros and NZ.

Well that's the dream...

Th ebest idea is just to sit on that egg... just keep on sitting on it and think about it hatching... sit on it a bit more and hope someone online guides you to sit on the egg at the correct angle with the correct weight ratio, then have another person on the same website tell you that the position and weight ratio you have chosen is totally wrong and that you should go back to basics.

Alternatively, look for somewhere to rent or buy... rent or buy it... enjoy the mountains...

You know it makes sense.

Might just cook it and eat it. Always been a greedy bug Laughing

Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:

A snowHead

Hi,
Watching this thread with interest as I share a similar ambition. Before I start searching the internet does anybody know how tax works when running a Limited company registered in the UK in France. What needs to be paid into the French tax system additional to those paid to HMRC?
Thanks

A snowHead

all this reminds of a famous quote i once heard about how to become a millionaire in the airline business

to which the answer was

start out as a billionaire!!!!!!

i can imagine there are numerous comparable quotes that could be attributed to running a chalet business!!!!!!!!!!

Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?

jakemanc, in the days when I did it, about 20 years ago, the business was treated as being a UK entity alone and so there were no earnings in France that were taxable. That meant selling from the UK however, with a UK company.

It's probably changed now...

Biggest headache I think you'd have would be employing people in France - that is definitely not as straightforward as it was when I did it.

Dave_N88, biggest concern I'd have is the relative overhead differences you wil have versus the big TOs (who at least partially run winter programs to offset annual costs of aircraft and management) and locals or retired folk who are running chalets but don't have mortgages or rents to pay.

You need to Login to know who's really who.

Freerider

Thanks for that, hopefully still similar, French taxes make things a bit of a non starter.

Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.

Dave_N88, you are wrong to reject Whitegold's advice out of hand. It might not be what you want to hear, but for the majority of non-owner/operator start-ups he is absolutely correct (at least in the Morzine area, and I don't see things being much different elsewhere). The local accountant (who does 90% of the chalet cos. here) says, on average over the last 15 years, 35 new chalet company start-ups per year, half don't make season2, another quarter fail before season4. All of them lose a lot of money, and the locals who own the chalets love them!

As under a new name says, your problem is british early-retirees and wealthy hobbyists (and their un-employable children) who can afford to undercut those who have to pay rent on their chalets. This effect is multiplied by the overheads supported by tennant-operators having to be fully legal, whereas a lot of hobbyists are under the radar.

The few tennant-operators who do survive have generally been doing it for years, run a very tight ship, have a loyal client base, and work very very hard to break-even. (btw I am not one of them). It's a terrible shame and has killed the vitality of the ski-bum community (those retirees don't party or ski too hard!) but c'est la vie.

The full-fat catered-chalet holiday is a declining niche in a declining market with an over-supply of often naive providers. My advice if you want to live in the alps is move over and start by doing what you're good at , what you're experienced at (even if that means commuting), and leave the rented-chalet business to those who can afford to lose money.

You'll need to Register first of course.

shep, "the vitality of the ski bum community", you mean, heyyyy, maannn, passs the splllliiiffffff, zzzzzz ?

wink

Then you can post your own questions or snow reports...

More seriously, "move over and start by doing what your good at , what you're experienced at (even if that means commuting), and leave the rented-chalet business to those who can afford to lose money."

Spot on. You can have a very fine lifestyle in or near the alps while working at "normal" job. Best of both worlds perhaps, especially if your occupation is flexible enough to allow proper exploitation of powder days!

After all it is free

A lot of the above is good, particularly from Bertie Bassett and Ratty. There are a lot of life style operations out there, only a few get through the other side but many simply have no idea from the start. The cull of Morzine operators is due to a number of things, a major factor is ignoring the French authorities: they turn up with a demand for tax and TVA that has not been budgeted for and the owners do a runner. It is perfectly possible to run a chalet business and enjoy the mountains but do not expect to make a fortune in the first few years.
If you are not ready now, you should get ready for the Spring: sales start early. Contracting takes place mainly during the winter (less so in busy ski holidays). Tourist offices are often useless; get into the ski hire shops and speak with other locals. They are all after making money: if a hire shop introduces you to an owner it will be a friend and you can expect to use the hire shop for your guests - they may even pretend that it is part of the contract (probably rubbish).
Times have certainly changed, in the early 90s even the likes of Crystal were not properly registered. You cannot ignore the authorities now but it need not cost as much as you might think and running your own show is far less onerous on employment issues.
Please get in touch if you want some professional advice: I worked in the industry for over 20 years.

Not wanting to put you off, I've done the sums and if you fill your chalet for the season you might walk away with a small profit maybe enough to survive the summer, if you only half fill it you will lose money. Somewhere inbetween you will break even. There will be a lot of extra work involved in running a business compared to just running the chalet and when you finish the sums question then if it is worth it and if you are prepared to risk so much money for at best a small return. Also look at whether between you you have the necessary skills beyond the hosting and cooking - marketing, accounts, internet, sales. Will taking all this on take the enjoyment out of being in the mountains as it will then become a fairly stressful occupation as opposed to a hard work job with a lot of fun. There is quite a lot to think about but I would say do the sums and make sure you have enough money to get through at least 3 seasons and then question what you want from the business in the longer term. It is achievable with the right skills, attitude and planning.

Help!!

Chalet Owners

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