Like any project, after the idea you have to put together a financing file. This may be frightening, appear anti-ecological or otherwise, but as it was an obligatory step, we thought about our financing as closely as possible with our social and ecological values…
We were able to set up this project thanks to 60 financiers!!! We are very grateful to them 
This page explains the basic financing but does not mention the people who helped us with donations, equipment, physical and moral assistance, etc… Many thanks!!! Together, we go further!!!
Here is in order how our financing was put together:
The basic contribution
Obviously, at the start there is us!!!
Living in Lille for 16 years, we managed to own a house in Lille where we also had guest rooms.
We sold that house and started putting together the financing with all of our savings, which was only a little over 16% of the amount.
That’s 2 already!
Having followed training on ecological buildings, we were aware of a form of financing other than banks. What if we asked people directly to lend us money rather than going through the bank? It’s called Participatory Loan, it’s accessible to everyone and it’s legally regulated 👍
Participatory Loan
What is participatory borrowing? It is a loan from person to person on the conditions of amount, duration and interest rate agreed between them.
We appealed to all our networks by email with the explanation of our project. And 53 people or couples responded favorably to lend us amounts ranging from €50 to €5,000 over periods of a few years to 10 years with an interest rate of their choice between 0 and 1.5%.
In total, around €60,000 loaned, to be repaid over 10 years for an overall interest rate of 0.20%!!!
This participatory loan was a real human experience. We also received many messages of support. It was WOW 🤩 🤩 🤩!
And the icing on the cake, the banks saw this loan as an additional contribution and additional motivation to follow us because there were already 55 of us in the boat 😉
Oulàlà, +53, that’s now 55!
Thank you Mélanie, Catherine, Laurette, Antoine, Elisabeth, Viviane, Eric, Sophie, Emmanuelle, Amandine, Aurélie, Eric, Vincent, Caroline, Olivia, Marie-Paule, Myriam, Olivier, Claudine, Jean-Michel, Geneviève, Julien, Grégory , Marie-Capucine, Jean-Marie, Ginette, Aurélie, Sarah, Frédérique, Pascale, Yvon, Christine, Anne-Sophie, Philippe, Sylvie, Aude, Véronique, Maxime, Julien, François, Claire, Vincent, Peter, Jean-Marc , Eric, Baya, Matthias, Sarah, Aurélien, Clément, Magali, Ludi, Charles-André, Driss, Delphine, Guillaume, Margaux, Frédérique, Audrey, Séverine, Céline, Ségolène, Constance, Mathias, Janine!
With these different contributions to the project, we then met the economic development department of the Choletais Agglomeration which referred us to the Anjou Initiative Network which helps with the installation or takeover of a business.
Honor Loans
Initiative France is the leading associative network for financing and supporting business creators, buyers and developers.
In Maine-et-Loire, it is Initiative Anjou which finances and supports business creation or takeover projects.
Passage through preparation of file and before an Initiative Anjou commission which finally granted us €60,000 of zero-interest loan to be repaid within 5 years.
The sum was loaned by 3 financiers:
- Anjou Initiative
- BPI France
- The Pays de la Loire region
And 3 more, that makes 58!
With all this support, we approached the banks to complete the financing of our project. Always with the aim of making our financing as green as possible, we naturally turned to NEF, an ethical bank and Crédit Mutuel, a cooperative bank. Both were willing to set up co-financing together.
La NEF
La Nef, a banking cooperative brings together professionals and individuals to build a fairer and more sustainable society. She defends healthy and transparent finance. His choice: only finance projects with ecological, social or cultural added value. The cooperative defends a short circuit of money: it has no activity on
financial markets and finance only the real economy.
we arrive at 59!
Le Crédit Mutuel
Crédit Mutuel is a mutual company made up of 2,100 local cooperative and mutual banks, grouped into 18 regional federations, themselves constituted into a national Confederation.
Crédit Mutuel is gradually beginning its ecological transition. It is today the only French bank to publish the entire carbon footprint of its loan portfolio as well as the distribution of its carbon footprint by sector of activity. It is also committed to reducing the carbon footprint of its large business portfolio.
Here are 60 financiers!