Leah and Peter

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Peter & Leah live Down Under on the Mornington Peninsula in Melbourne, Australia and travel frequently to the UK and Europe for holidays and to visit their daughter who is now living and working in London. They understand the advantages of increased timing flexibility they now enjoy and see the geographic spread of the August holiday home locations as fitting into their new lifestyle and providing the perfect bases for their next adventures.

Let's meet this family,

Via zoom, and on the other side of the world; we met up with our most recent August family, Leah and Peter, who joined the Signature Collection after discovering August a while ago. Regardless of wherever you are in the world, those in Australia should not miss out on what Europe has to offer.

"Greetings from London! It's lovely to see the sun shining in behind you, as well as your happy faces! We're so glad Australia is no longer under lockdown; before you know it, you'll be hopping on a plane and holidaying in your five European homes!"

Tell us a little bit about your journey to discovering August?

"Some time ago we were looking around for a second home in France, and we were packing and ready to go to France for a two-month vacation, where the intended holiday was to find more information about the properties available and to decide if we wanted a second home in France, and how we'd go about the purchasing journey. Unfortunately, COVID struck a few weeks before we were about to walk out the door, and we were locked down for much longer than we anticipated; no one was expecting it! This meant that our dreams of owning a second home had to be put on hold for the time being.

When we discovered August, we just fell in love with the concept and immediately saw the transparency of the business model. We totally understand it, as it's just great that we can see where exactly it comes from, what motivates August. This was refreshing to see after an unfortunate start to second home ownership.  As a member of boat syndication, I was already familiar with the concept of co-ownership. The possibility of being able to co-own properties just made sense for us, especially as we're on the other side of the world...

The more we spent thinking about the concept of August, the more appropriate it seemed perhaps for us to actually take advantage of the idea, to not be tied to single property ownership. As you know, we had an unfortunate start, but looking back on the journey to that itself, researching the French taxes, inheritance issues; it all seemed too much of a hassle for one property and we've done this before in our own country, but doing it again within Europe just seemed exhausting.

As we're on the other side of the world and the homes are so far away, we're having to put a lot of trust into August, obviously, which has been a very transparent process. Mélie reassured us and there wasn't a question that she didn't know the answer to!

So all in this together led us towards August and the influences of being locked down and frustrated we decided to make the leap with August. Prior to joining August, we did extensive research on the website and asked as many questions as we could (and lots of Zoom calls!).

‍Which homes are you looking forward to visiting?

Our daughter lives in London, so we plan to visit the homes a few times a year, and the idea of staying for a few weeks at a time is ideal for us because our travel schedule is completely flexible. She, of course, has already started asking about the Cotswolds...

We've never been to Mallorca, but all of the locations look beautiful, especially Tuscany; we'll definitely be visiting all of the properties at some point and we may plan one or two girls' trips for Leah and our daughter! We appreciate the benefits of the European winter, and as a family, we're keen skiers so we will be staying in our Chamonix home for sure! However, we're looking forward to balancing the summer activities like boating, diving, wining, dining, and touring!

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The homes' purpose, and how we'll use them as a family, is to serve as a base for us to reconnect, as well as entertain family and friends. When the Cotswolds is completed, our daughter will be there in a heartbeat! She can join us wherever we are in Europe and spend some quality time together because her job allows her a lot of flexibility.

Another point to why we took a liking to August, is that we do have other properties than the one we live in, in Melbourne. We understand the maintenance and having to keep the property running, it's just a pain in the neck for us and we're in the same country; let alone doing this in Europe!

Nonetheless, we've realised that we've gone through a lot with the pandemic and you just don't know what's going to happen so having the opportunity to stay in our homes, and not having to back and forth with the idea of second property ownership just makes us feel settled and we're so excited to discover Europe!"

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More families are discovering August as a better way to own second homes in Europe. Find out more by booking a call to speak to us or send us an email at info@augustcollection.co.uk.

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