Clear, Accurate Guidance for Foreign Property Investors in France
Welcome to The English Investor. If you invest in French property, or you are thinking about it, you have probably already discovered the problem this site exists to solve: reliable information in English is strangely hard to find. French notaires assume you read legal French for pleasure, English-speaking advisers rarely go deeper than the brochure version of French law, and the expat forums – well-meaning as they are – have a habit of being confidently wrong about exactly the things that cost money. This site covers the legal structures, the tax rules, the rental strategies and the unglamorous practical decisions that actually decide whether a French property investment works, in plain English, sourced from the primary law.
Who I Am
I am a lawyer qualified in three jurisdictions – New York, England & Wales and Paris – with degrees from Georgetown Law and Sciences Po, and more than a decade in private practice behind me, most of it in M&A and capital markets, with French real estate running alongside as the personal thread that gradually took over my evenings and, eventually, this much of my life. French is my first language together with English, and I split my time between London and France, which turns out to be the right vantage point for a site like this one: close enough to the French system to read it in the original, far enough away to remember exactly how baffling it looks from the outside.
I also own and manage French property through my own SCIs, which frankly matters more than the diplomas. The structures, the tax returns, the tenants, the works, the paperwork – the things you read about here are things I deal with personally, not theory rewritten from somebody else’s guide. And I write under a pseudonym, because professional obligations tied to my current role require it. I have made my peace with the trade-off: a site with no name on it has to earn trust the hard way, so every material claim here stands on the quality of its sourcing – there is a citation to Légifrance, BOFiP, impots.gouv.fr or the Cour de cassation behind it, and you are warmly encouraged to go and check.
A Small War Story From My Own Files
Last winter, a tenant moved out of one of the furnished flats I manage through a family SCI, and her lawyer opened proceedings the way these things usually open: a barrage of formal letters demanding the full deposit back, each one a little more indignant than the last. The centrepiece of the claim was a washing machine. It had been marked “to be checked” on the entry inspection, it broke down shortly after she moved in, and that combination – so ran the argument – made it a pre-existing defect, which would have made it my problem.
Except the lawyer’s own letter conceded the machine had been used three times after move-in, which is an awkward thing to put in writing about an appliance you are calling dead on arrival. Her own messages, and the technician who inspected the thing, pointed somewhere less convenient: overloading. So instead of capitulating, I returned the deposit minus two invoiced, documented deductions – the replacement machine, and the intervention costs, including a bathroom seal the exit inspection itself had flagged as degraded, a textbook réparation locative chargeable to the tenant under the 1987 décret. Then, to close the file, I offered to waive the smaller of the two invoices as a goodwill gesture. The lawyer said he would take instructions and revert. He never did. No claim, no hearing, file closed.
That little episode is, in miniature, the philosophy of this entire site: keep disciplined records, know the loi de 1989 well enough to hold a fair line politely, and make one measured concession at the end – because that, and not the indignant letters, is what actually finishes these disputes.
What You Will Find Here
Pillar guides that walk you through buying, owning, letting and selling French property as a non-resident, step by step. The SCI library – creation, statutes, comptes courants d’associés, accounting – because the SCI is where most foreign structures live and where most foreign mistakes happen. The full tax stack, from income tax and capital gains to IFI, taxe foncière and whatever the latest loi de finances has just rearranged. The eviction and tenant-management series, for when things go wrong. And plain-English commentary on new Cour de cassation rulings and legislation that actually affect foreign owners, usually within days of them landing – because half the value of following this area closely is hearing about a change before your notaire mentions it.
Why This Site Is Different
Three commitments, kept deliberately boring and absolute. Every figure is verified against an official source before it is published, and fact-checked again before it goes live – when in doubt, a claim gets softened or cut rather than rounded up. Every article tells you when the law changed and what is still pending, because the real danger in this field is confidently applying last year’s rules. And nothing here is disguised advertising: where affiliate links appear they are flagged as such, and no provider pays for coverage or placement.
Work With Me
I take on a small number of private consultations for readers with cross-border French property questions – structuring a purchase, an SCI issue, a tenant dispute, a tax-residency wrinkle. If that is you, get in touch via the contact page with a short description of your situation, and I will tell you honestly whether I can help.
Get in Touch
For everything else – corrections, suggestions, topics you want covered – the contact page reaches me directly. The newsletter is the best way to get each new guide as it is published: subscribe here. And if you prefer the day-to-day – new rulings, deadlines, the occasional courtroom skirmish – follow me on X.