IT TOOK David and Pamela Guy only three weeks to find their home in the sun. Committed Francophiles, they had taken holidays across the Channel for 20 years, often staying with Pamela’s cousins in southern France. So when her health demanded that they downshifted, they looked at just 15 houses before moving lock, stock and barrel from Worcestershire to Fontareches (population: 196) in the Gard department of Languedoc-Roussillon.

Says David: “We have never considered it ‘living abroad’ — to us it’s just down the road and a bit farther. It is our home and we now know more people in the locality after two and half years than we ever did, living in Evesham.”

The couple, both teachers, are not unusual in choosing to live in France. But they are representative of the rapidly growing number of Britons who, having visited France on holiday, are buying, converting and renting homes in France to the next generation of holidaymakers.

It is a discernible trend. Carol Bowhill began renting out houses in France 30 years ago when all her properties were locally owned. This year, one-third of her 300 cottages and villas are owned by Britons living here or across the Channel.

And the trend is accelerating. According to a travel company survey, one in ten Britons will specifically put time aside on their French summer holiday to look for properties.

I visited Fontareches last week, when the temperature had been above 30C every day for a month. From their terrace under a spreading olive tree, Pamela and David can see the farmer tending his vineyard. Little else is stirring.

In the course of my two-hour visit, a couple of cars tootle by and one woman on a bike, followed by a panting labrador. “That’s Bridget,” says Pamela. “She and her husband have a wooden lodge near by. He helps with the Tour de France. He can be away for weeks. They’ve got a son,” her train of thought unconsciously painting a watercolour of her neighbours.

The couple now have time to ruminate but they can’t afford to do nothing. Like many Britons now buying in France, the couple need an income — and the most obvious way is through tourism.

They bought the house for £135,000 and spent a further £20,000 converting it. Now a high wall and corridor, both with connecting doors, separate the two-bedroom holiday property from theirs. Out of season, it all becomes their home again — including the terrace and pool.

David says: “We have put everything into it, given up everything and couldn’t afford to live here unless we rented out.

“We have rented places like this on holiday for years so we knew what we wanted to create. Pam is an interior designer and knowing what gave us pleasure, we knew we could make it work for other people on holiday.”

When the Guys visited France in the 1970s and 1980s, a holiday in the country usually meant a run-down gîte with flock wallpaper, a rickety table and an uncommunicative French farmer-owner who didn’t understand a word of English when the shower broke down.

Now the most popular properties are cottages with character — but with modern facilities and decor — in the right place, the right size, with a terrace and pool. OK, going native is nice, but there’s more chance of getting the plumbing fixed with an English-speaking owner or agent.