buying a skiflat

[greygirl]

every year (about this time) a girl's fancy turns to buying her own flat in the alps. now on my wages it will be a 1 bedroomed cupboard in a cheap resort. I am sure someone else here has their own skiflat, so my question to these lucky people is:
a)is it a lot of hassle re:finding flat to buy/maintaining said flat/local taxes etc?
b) is it ok going back to the same place every year?do you pick someone with a choice of local resorts nearby?
c)how often do you get there - is the expense of travel too much for a lot of weekend breaks?
d) do you rent it out easily?regularly?or never rent it because the trust fund says you can't?
any comments please, it's really just a pipe dream, but i've had it a while and wonder whether it is a good dream or a bad one.
(other half's plan is to buy flat in uk, rent out and when we are retired rent a flat out for a season in different resorts each winter. but what if i don't make it??)

we have a chalet in divonne-les-bains - dh inherited it and there aren't that many in our particular location overlooking Mnt Blanc. we have never let it out, usually fly there a couple of times a year (we live in London). due to school holidays, we visit for very short periods of time (via Geneva), dh deals with the taxes etc but he is from a french speaking country so it must be less daunting than it would be for me. close friends stay there sometimes (though you really have to be sure about them to handover the keys). dh and the dcs ski (i have always hated skiing) and they seem quite happy with returning to the chalet and i am quite happy to rattle around there on my own during the day. i understand that they ski in different places (up to 1 hr away) occasionally.
feel lucky to have it but it is a bit wasted on us, i suppose

A friend owns a ski lodge in France, and from his experience -

• you need to either speak French yourself or have a good friend who does; French bureaucracy is quite impressive, especially if you are not a national ;-) He owns a car that lives there too, which was also quite spectacularly hard in terms of legalities to sort out.
• his is in what was a tiny resort when he bought it and now a small to medium sized one, so plenty to ski there, but also easy reach of the three valleys/val d'isere. We all go there lots and the novelty hasn't worn off yet - indeed, it's nice going somewhere where you know everything, what's good/bad, you know the local bar owner etc!
• he goes lots, but he's a banker...it's about 2.5 hours from Geneva, so long weekends are do-able. Any further and it would be pushing it I think.
• he never rents it, so can't help there.

He has a number pad lock on it now after losing so many keys to friends who forget to give them back and end up going home with them! (it sleeps 8-10 so lots of people tend to have visited and got keys).

thank you for your comments. i may still continue to dream - i live in cheshier and 'getting over for a weekend' is a bit harder than from geneva!