I've just returned (yesterday in fact!) from a return trip to our place in the Languedoc (2,500 faultless miles in my Rover 75 - the best motorway cruiser I have ever driven!). Whilst I don't mind driving one of my right hand drive cars in France, and often do (I drive far more in France than in the U.K.) I much prefer using a LHD car. They are unquestionably safer, and for that reason cheaper to insure (french car insurance is expensive enough - twice the English cost). I have bought my previous LHD cars in the uk, already french-registered; there are several dealers in the U.K. who specialise in this kind of thing. One can find them easily enough on the Internet. Whilst in theory it ought be easy enough to re-register an English-registered car in France, in practice it's a nightmare involving lots of forms, documents and visits to the prefecture. French bureaucracy is unbelievable at times. This process can easily take months, during which time the car is unusable. It's much easier to buy a french car with french plates, and crucially an up-to-date Control Technique, and just register it in your name and french address. And although the recent exchange rate movements might have affected matters I have also found used cars to be appreciably cheaper in England than in France, for various reasons that have been explained to me. Also, buying a used car in France can be a depressing experience - they seem to go from shiny and new to battered smelly old banger in about three years, although this is of course a generalisisation! But finding a well looked-after car in France does seem to be more of a struggle. Ironically my last french car - a 20 year-old Ford Focus which provided me with ten years and 100,000 faultless kms - has just failed its last Control Technique and I'm back in the market for a replacement. I do see Rovers quite often in the south of France but they are usually 200s and 400s, often obviously well-used but well-loved by their owners. 600s and 800s are never seen (they're not that common in the U.K. now!) and R75s very rarely. My P6s draw crowds...
I love my 75 but I wouldn't keep one in France, at least not for long, unless I either knew a garagist who understood the car, or I was prepared to fully maintain it myself. I don't subscribe to any stereotypical notions about french mechanics; I find them to be equally good and bad both sides of the channel, you just have to find a good one, but my local garage seems far more comfortable with Citroen/Renault/Ford/Peugeot, etc, particularly if the car is a more elderly model. Dealerships for newer cars just want to plug in a laptop and replace whatever part it instructs them to replace - or sell you another one.
Bon Courage!
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