3 properties for sale in Calvados — Under €300,000

Up to €300,000 is a price band at which a wider choice opens up in the French property market. At €300,000 in the Charente and Deux-Sèvres, the maison de maître — France's classic symmetrical manor house — is firmly within reach: five or six bedrooms, high ceilings, park grounds and outbuildings. In the Dordogne, €300,000 buys well-presented stone farmhouses in areas including: the medieval bastide country around Eymet, Issigeac and Monpazier; the Vézère valley near Les Eyzies; the Périgord Noir heartland around Sarlat. Gîte complexes — two separate letting units with a pool — become a realistic target at this price in the Charente and Ariège, offering a genuine lifestyle-and-income proposition. For buyers who have always aspired to the French dream — the large stone house, the barn, the big garden, the pool, the view — €300,000 in the right department of south-west France makes that dream entirely achievable.