Case Study · A Close Look
Aigurande: A Serviced £16k Cottage — But Read the Ground
This one starts with a real advantage the others didn't have — water and electricity already connected — and a big garden for the money. But it's small, it has no barn, it's rated a thermal sieve, and the ground here moves in a drought. A candidate worth a look, with your eyes open. Here's the full workup.
Aigurande, Indre (36) · on the Creuse border, the Boischaut Sud · ≈ 560 km / 5¾ hrs from Calais · ≈ 580 km / 6.9 hrs from Bern
After La Cellette came through the checks clean, this is a near-neighbour just north over the Creuse border — a similar cheap cottage, but one that scores very differently once you run the ground. It's worth the same full workup precisely because the contrast is instructive.
📸 See the photos: view the full Aigurande listing on Properstar → (opens in a new tab)
The free routine that separates this one from La Cellette — run it on any place before you travel.
Run the checklist →🔑 Haggling a Long-Empty WreckA G-rated cottage that needs work is a buyer's-market house — how to price the reno in and make a low offer stick.
Read the guide →🌿 Creuse & Haute-Vienne guideAigurande sits on the northern lip of this belt — the same granite country, pricing and drive.
Read the guide →The listing, in full
The agent (SAFTI) offers a 48 m² single-storey house from 1900 in Aigurande, a small market town on the Indre/Creuse border. Inside, all on one level: a living room, a separate kitchen, one bedroom and a shower room with WC, plus a lean-to, a back shed and a courtyard. Outside there's a 1,898 m² garden with a garden shed and, across the E439 road, a second plot of about 2,392 m² in a Natural zone. The house is connected to water and electricity, and "work is to be planned." Selling price about £16,000 (≈ €18,700), agency fees paid by the seller.
- Price≈ €18,700 (≈ £16,000) — fees paid by the seller
- Rates (taxe foncière)Not stated — a serviced town cottage, so likely more than a bare ruin; confirm with the agent
- LocationAigurande (36140), southern Indre — the Boischaut Sud, on the Creuse border
- Drive from Calais≈ 560 km / ~5¾ hrs (one of the kinder ones)
- Drive from Bern≈ 580 km / 6.9 hrs
- House48 m² single-storey, built 1900
- RoomsLiving room, separate kitchen, one bedroom, shower room with WC
- Land1,898 m² garden + a 2,392 m² Natural-zone plot (no building) across the road
- OutbuildingsLean-to, back shed, garden shed — no barn or garage
- Build / materials1900 build — material not stated on the listing (likely stone/brick; confirm)
- WaterConnected
- ElectricityConnected
- Drainage / sanitationNot stated — confirm (mains or a SPANC septic?)
- HeatingElectric convectors — plan to replace (see DPE)
- Energy rating (DPE)G (455) — the worst band, but it unlocks the deepest aid
- Condition"Work to be planned" — a full refurb, but already serviced
- Detached?Reads detached (own courtyard + garden) — confirm
- AgentSAFTI (Christophe Millet)
Saved on this device only — not published, not shared, and not visible to anyone else.
The good worth having
Serviced from day one
Water and electricity are already connected — the one thing none of the ruins can say. That removes the cost, the paperwork and the wait of bringing services to the plot, and it's a genuine head start on getting a room liveable.
Single-storey, big garden, town on the doorstep
All on one level (easy to live in while you work on it), nearly half an acre of garden, and a market town's shops — and its déchèterie — a short walk away. For a low-drama base rather than a deep-rural project, that convenience is worth real money.
Cheap, fees-paid — and aid-friendly
£16,000 with the fees on the seller, and the G rating, for all the work it signals, is exactly what opens the door to the biggest French renovation grants if you bring in certified trades.
Where it sits
Aigurande is in the far south of the Indre (36), in the Boischaut Sud — the granite border country where the Indre meets the Creuse, historically "La Marche." It's the same rock and the same cheap, quiet, farmed landscape as the Creuse belt just south, with a small town's shops and services on the doorstep. The drive is one of the kinder ones we cover: ≈ 560 km / 5¾ hours from Calais down the A20 corridor.
The bad what needs doing
No barn, no garage
This is the big one against the brief. There's a lean-to, a back shed and a garden shed — handy, but not a barn or a lockable garage. No workshop, no dry store for materials and tools, no obvious way to add real living space. For a hands-on renovation where the outbuilding does half the work, that's a genuine miss.
Rated G — a thermal sieve
The DPE comes back G (455 kWh/m²/yr), the worst band, heated by electric convectors — the most expensive way to warm a leaky old house. You'd be tearing that out and starting the heating from scratch: insulation first, then a wood burner and one warm room. Budget for it as a certainty, not a maybe — though a G rating is exactly what unlocks the deepest renovation grants if you use certified trades. (It also matters for resale: G-rated homes are increasingly hard to let or sell without work.)
The second plot is a "Natural" zone
That extra 2,392 m² across the road sounds like the land bonus — but it's classed zone Naturelle, which means no building on it. It's fine as meadow, orchard or growing ground, and it's yours, but don't count it as development potential. The usable home plot is the 1,898 m² around the house.
The ground check
The routine that killed Thollet — Géorisques, run on the commune (INSEE 36001).
⚠️ These ground figures (flood, subsidence, radon) are official records for the commune — real, but commune-wide, not proof for this exact plot. Check it yourself: official Géorisques risk report (ERRIAL) → — enter the property address.
Clay: patchy, with a subsidence history
Unlike La Cellette's clean "Faible," Aigurande is a mixed read. The point map at the town centre isn't in a high-clay zone — but the commune carries two drought-subsidence ("Sécheresse") disaster declarations (2019 and 1996–97) and "differential settlement" is officially flagged. In plain terms: the clay here does move in dry summers, in patches. That's not the seven declarations that sank Thollet, but it's a long way from clean — so the exact plot needs a precise address-level clay check before anything else.
⚠️ Radon: high (class 3 of 3)
Granite country again, and here it's the top band — same as Coubjours. Radon is a natural radioactive gas that rises from the bedrock and pools indoors; at this level it's a design-and-ventilate job: an aired under-floor void, a sealed ground floor, a test kit once you're in. Manageable, but it has to be planned and budgeted.
No flood zone, no mining and low seismic risk — so the ground story is entirely clay and radon, both of them "plan-around," neither of them clean.
DIY-er vs needs-a-builder the honest split
A small, already-serviced cottage — friendlier for a DIYer than most, with two certified jobs to buy in.
If you're hands-on — what you can do yourself
With water and power already in and only 48 m² to tackle, the bulk is well within a competent DIYer: insulation, plasterboard and floors, the shower room and kitchen, windows, decorating, and swapping the electric convectors for a wood burner (with a certified sweep). It's about as approachable as a full refurb gets — the money stays close to materials.
Where you'll need a pro (or a builder)
• The electrics — if you rewire, a registered electrician and a Consuel certificate to keep it insurable.
• Drainage — if it's not on mains and the septic needs replacing, that's a SPANC-approved installer, not a DIY sign-off (confirm which it is first).
• A ground opinion — given the subsidence history, worth a professional read of the address-level clay before you commit, so any movement is priced in.
What you'll need to clear it the van
A T5-style van, and the tip's in town
It's a small house with modest clutter rather than a barn full of rubble, so a medium T5-style van clears it in a few runs — and unlike the rural places, the déchèterie is right in Aigurande, so the trips are short.
Getting rid of the rubble — the local tip read this first
Nearest déchèterie: in Aigurande itself
The Déchèterie d'Aigurande (Le Verret, 36140) sits in the town — a real convenience for a refurb, with none of the drive the rural candidates carry.
But — residents only, like the UK
A French déchèterie serves the local community's residents: you need a justificatif de domicile (a local bill in your name) and usually to register or carry a badge. A UK- or Swiss-plated van with no French address won't get in, exactly as at a British tip. Until you've completed and have a local address, budget a private skip (benne) for the first clear-out.
The score
Lifted by the connected water and power and the big garden, dragged down by the missing barn and the clay-and-radon ground. It lands in the lower-middle of the rankings — a soft landing, not a sound-ground bargain.
The verdict
A watch, but a clear step below La Cellette. What's genuinely good: it's cheap, single-storey, already on water and power, with a big garden and a town's services close by — a soft, low-drama base if all you want is a small serviced cottage. What holds it back is real: no barn or garage, a G rating that means a full heating-and-insulation rebuild, high radon, and a clay-subsidence history that the price doesn't warn you about. If a workshop and sound ground matter to you — and for this kind of project they usually do — La Cellette is the stronger buy for less money. Aigurande earns a viewing only if the services and the garden outweigh the missing barn. Next step, as ever: the exact address and an address-level clay check before a single mile.
How we judge every place
Same free routine, every time — it's what tells a clean "Faible" from a clay-and-radon "plan-around" before you ever get in the van.
See the search log →