On Thursday, January 7th we went on our annual sojourn to the Préfecture de Police to renew our residence permits. Our original appointment was December 10th, the day before we were leaving for a Mexican cruise vacation. It seemed then to be a good thing that the nice lady at the Préfecture asked us if […]
Moving to Paris
We finally get our Cartes de Séjour (residence permits)
Since November we’ve been working to assemble the paperwork required to spend another year in France. The French name for the residence permit we need is carte de séjour. A week ago we had an the appointment at the Préfecture de Police to present our dossier and receive the permit. We documented in an earlier […]
A new apartment in Paris
We’ve moved just 3 blocks from our first apartment in a medieval building along the Seine to a new apartment in Paris built on Boulevard Saint-Germain during the Haussmannian era of the mid 1800s. From roughly 1850 to 1870 France was governed by Emperor Napoleon III, who as a main priority set about remodeling Paris […]
Notary Service at the US Embassy Paris
I recently had to use the Notary Service at the US Embassy Paris. My strategy to transfer funds from our US bank to our account in France has been to use a 3rd party company, Venstar Exchange, to provide a better exchange rate than we could get through the bank. A US bank might charge […]
Getting a Carte de Séjour (Residence Permit)
Before I relate our process of obtaining a residence permit, a note of caution: Information we found on other Internet blogs was not always reliable and up to date. You will need to do your own research. The requirements change often. There have been major changes to the Préfecture de Police Web site even since […]
Getting a French Visa
Most tourists coming to Paris from the US never have to worry about getting a French Visa, but since 2009, to remain in France for longer than 3 months, you must have the permission of the government. Though we arrived in France in late January, we started the procedure to obtain a Visa early in […]
