Most cost effective way to run several small businesses in France?

We are a British couple and moved to France three years ago. My husband runs an auto-entrepreneur business installing English TV for clients and I set up a business selling nappy cakes, also as an auto-entrepreneur.

The nappy cakes business hasn’t been doing very well, so over the last three years we have started a few other little side businesses to supplement our income. But what started as just little side incomes have now developed into more serious lines of business so we are looking for the best way to go forward with all these streams of income. Naturally the biggest concern is tax as we have found that as an auto-entrepreneur your pay very high tax.

Here is a brief description of the businesses we currently run.

• Setting up English TV for English speaking clients in France. We bought the company when we moved to France and then just set it up as auto-entrepreneurship - but the name is very well known in this area so would like to keep the name.
• Property management which includes many services such as cleaning; gardening, pool maintenance, key holding etc. The problem is that the client pay us for everything and we then pay people who help us with these services (so effectively we manage the subcontracting). Up to now we have just used friends and family but we potentially have three more properties to manage this summer. How do we avoid having to pay huge tax on full amounts going into our account (most of which is directly paid out to others) and the legality of employing others, i.e do all the cleaners need to be registered?
• French students book in to stay with us for a week or two and we teach them English (as well as feeding them and taking them on activities). This is done via an agency. Supposedly there is a way to do so with little or no tax to pay on the income? Some of the host families do this under the umbrella of having a gite - but we are only renting our house at the moment so not sure if this is possible.
• Cooking: My husband has been asked to cook curries once a month for English clients at a venue nearby. This is not high income but it is something that could develop in future.
• Gite: We are also looking at maybe buying a small flat to rent out in future - this is only planned for the future but may as well mention our intent now so as to include it in our structure going forward.

Some people have suggested registering one of the businesses in the UK and continuing to pay the minimum National Insurance (NI) contributions so that you qualify for a UK pension (as it is worth more than French pension) But this then makes it difficult for mortgages/loans here in France. It all just seems a bit of a nightmare at the moment so we are looking for someone that knows the UK and French systems well enough to advise us what would be best for our situation.

1. Basically we are looking for the most cost effective way to run all of these businesses legitimately in France. Is it worth setting it all up under one name and having various aspects/services listed under this or is it better to register each individually?
2. Is there a more cost effective way than the auto-entrepreneur (with mortgage applications, pensions etc. taken into account)? It seems crazy to pay so much tax on 1,000 euros/quarter for cleaning services if, in effect, you’re only making about 250 euros profit.