A Riviera Arrival service

This is the fuller version of something I already offer on the "I'll find your place" page — the short version is the pitch; this is what actually happens once you say yes. I don't run a listings site. I do this personally, one client at a time, which means I can tell you exactly what the process looks like from the inside.

How it starts — telling me what you actually need

We start with a conversation, not a form. Budget, obviously, but also the things people forget to mention until the third apartment falls through — whether you need to be near a specific school or office, whether you can handle stairs and no lift, whether "quiet" means no traffic noise or no neighbors above you. The more honest this conversation is, the less time we both waste later on places that were never going to work.

Where I actually look

Some of what I find comes from the same portals anyone can search, but a good amount comes from relationships I've built with local agencies and owners over time — places that get filled through a phone call before they're ever posted publicly. I also keep an ear out through the local network I write about in my journal; more than once, a good lead has come from a shopkeeper mentioning that their landlord friend has a place coming free.

It also means I'm not restricted to whichever agency happens to have the best-photographed listing that week. If your budget or must-haves are unusual — a top-floor flat with a lift, a place that takes a dog the size of mine, somewhere within stroller distance of a specific school — I'll go looking specifically for that rather than sending you whatever's easiest to find.

Shortlisting, not flooding your inbox

I don't send twenty links and let you sort through them — I visit or thoroughly vet a place myself before it makes your shortlist, so that by the time you see three or four options, all of them are genuinely worth your time. It's slower than a search filter, but it means you're not the one discovering the "cozy" studio is actually a converted closet.

Viewings and negotiation

If you're not in France yet, I can do first-pass viewings on your behalf and walk you through what I saw over video before you commit to a trip. When it comes to the offer itself — price, move-in date, what's included — I negotiate on your behalf the way I'd want someone negotiating for me: firmly, politely, and without pretending I don't know the market.

This is also where local knowledge quietly earns its keep — knowing that a certain building always overprices because of the view, or that a landlord who's rented through the same agency for a decade is usually more flexible on move-in date than the listing suggests. None of that shows up in a search filter; it comes from having done this before, in this specific market.

What this service isn't

It isn't a marketplace, and I'm not listing every apartment on the Riviera for you to browse — there's no catalogue to scroll, because there's no catalogue at all. It's a personal service with one client's search running at a time, which is exactly why it works — I'm not trying to fill inventory, I'm trying to find your place. If you're specifically after the mechanics of viewings and paperwork rather than having someone do it for you, the apartment search & viewings page covers that side in more detail.

How long it usually takes

It depends enormously on how specific the brief is and how flexible the timeline is — a straightforward studio in a popular area can come together in two or three weeks; something particular in a tight neighborhood can take longer. I'd rather be honest about that upfront than promise a date I can't keep. What I can promise is that I won't stop looking, and I won't send you places just to look busy.

The best part of this work, honestly, is the short, unremarkable message I get a few weeks after someone moves in — not asking for anything, just telling me they're settled. That's the whole point.

Ask Nathalie