‘Better healthcare and near Spain’: why we retired to Pyrénées-Orientales

When Norman Lauritsen, 78, and his wife, Norma, retired in 2003, they bought a motorhome and spent four years exploring Europe, looking for their perfect home. 

Mr Lauritsen had enjoyed a long career in management in the international pharmaceutical industry before running a hotel in the Scottish Highlands. 

But the couple wanted to look further afield for their retirement property. 

“We wanted sea and mountains, beautiful countryside, but most of all warmth,” he said. 

The couple, from Edinburgh, started by looking at Italy and Spain, but eventually decided on France. 

“In Italy we loved the food and the relaxed lifestyle, but found too much of the country to be dirty and neglected. In Spain, it was the same, particularly in the far south, and too many of the coastal resort areas were overcrowded and unattractive,” he said. 

After hearing horror stories about problems with buying property in Spain, the couple looked just over the border in North Catalonia, in the Pyrénées-Orientales department of southern France.

“Both my wife and I had studied French at school so at least the language was not a blank canvas,” Mr Lauritsen said. 

“While our top priority was a warm climate, we realised that in old age you can have too much of a good thing, so looked to avoid the plain of Roussillon and instead focused on the valleys of the Têt and Tech.”

The couple used a British estate agent based in France to view several homes in both valleys. 

“The Têt had a better road infrastructure and some great attractions around Prades and further up the valley. On the other hand, the Tech valley benefited from easy access to Spain, which was very attractive to us and Ceret was an excellent cultural, business and medical centre. In the end, we settled on a lovely house near Serralongue.”

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The house 

Built in 1796, the house was the home of the manager of the adjacent forge. It is the oldest building in a hamlet of nine houses and is spread over four floors.

“It had been restored to a considerable degree in the 1950s by a retired French appeal court judge,” said Mr Lauritsen. 

“Structurally sound, the house lacked all modern amenities – rudimentary electrics, only cold water feeding a kitchen tap, and an outside toilet."

The couple bought the house in 2007 and spent the next 12 years dividing their time between Scotland and France, restoring the house and garden to its original, but modernised, state. 

A particular labour of love has been the garden, which was terraced with the river Lamanère running along its length. Many of the terraces had collapsed and surrounding forest had taken hold of some of the land, creating a serious job for the new owners. 

“I have created a number of "zones" to try to manage the large space. We have a "potager" which is perfect for growing vegetables, a fruit cage for raspberries and blackberries, a shrubbery with cornus, camelias, rhus and forsythia. The Mediterranean garden has our local plants – oleander, yucca, and lavender – and adjoins a pergola, a lovely space for morning coffee, shaded and sheltered by climbing roses, jasmine and wisteria." 

Mr Lauritsen also created a Japanese garden, and a kitchen garden with a variety of herbs. 

Read more: Best places to live in France for over-60s, according to new ranking

Making the move full-time 

Brexit pushed the couple to decide on where they wanted to settle more permanently. 

“By that time we were sufficiently happy with our life in France that we were very content to apply for citizenship and look forward to spending the rest of our lives in the Vallespir.” 

The two biggest and most welcome surprises the couple have found are related to tax and healthcare. 

“Our income is heavily skewed towards my private pensions, and as in the UK, we were taxed as individuals, my income was into the 40% tax band and was made worse as our residence was in Scotland. In France, our income is split between the two of us, keeping us in the lower tax bands. As a result, we have saved several thousand pounds per annum,” said Mr Lauritsen. 

“With regard to healthcare, we were initially concerned about leaving the security of the NHS, but experience has shown us that French healthcare is generally better, cheaper and quicker than in the UK. The mix of State and private provision, particularly in diagnostics, makes it much easier to shop around for early appointments, and top-up medical insurance is much cheaper in France than in the UK.”