Renting a flat in Lille for a few months - options beyond Air BnB?

I'm an English teacher living in France. If you're trying to learn French, I definitely recommend a 'colocation' (flatsharing). It's cheaper, less complicated, the electricity & phone are already connected, etc. (These are major headaches here, especially if your French isn't strong yet). Having a roommate gives you more contact with French & French people. You might be able to get your housemates to let your friends stay, but why not turn to Air bnb for their visits? You'd probably save enough on rent to afford that, and you might want to take short trips out of town with friends too.

As suggested above, try searching for a 'colocation' + name of city/neighborhood and you should pull up answers from sites like Le Bon Coin or Appartager.

You don't say how old you are. If you are a bona fide student under 28 (enrolled at a university or in higher education) be aware that you may be eligible for housing aid through the 'CAF' too, even if you are foreign and not there for a whole school year.

I will go ahead and put in an official answer rather than just long comments :)

1) IMO homeaway is by far the biggest and easiest place to find 1-week gites. vrbo (not yet part of the homeaway group, unless you're reading this in the future) is second biggest

2) there is IMO no specific "longer holiday rentals (two weeks plus)" site in france/europe

3) in fact a number of places (5%?) on homeaway are indeed marked "longer rentals welcome!"

4) i'd say today (2014) 100% of gite owners in france, will jump at the chance to rent for longer term: and they will slash the price. (this is even more true in italy, spain, etc)

In a word. IMO to "find a two month holiday rental" ... you would in fact just use homeaway (just like when you find a normal holiday rental) but you'd specify to the owner you want a much better price (which is totally standard for longer rentals). hope it helps someone!

I think Abritel is somewhat comparable to Airbnb. It's certainly quite popular in France but the emphasis is mostly on rentals for a week or a couple of nights, not for one or two months.

I know a fair number of Americans who use vrbo for longer vacation rentals in France. However, in my experience it requires a bit more digging to find a good option than Airbnb.

Airbnb is the easy option since it's well known and you're pretty shure that you're getting a good accommodation. The thing is for long stays Airbnb will end up much more expencive then some french websites. I'm a Irish student studying in france and I found a flat thanks to gotoo, it's a small company that is spécialised in renting to expats. They were really efficient and I got the flat that I wanted in no time