Guides

Déficit Foncier: How French Landlords Turn Renovation Bills Into a Tax Deduction, and Why It Works Differently From Abroad

Let a French home unfurnished and spend more on it than it earns, and up to €10,700 a year (€21,400 for energy works until 2027) can come off your other income. How the déficit foncier is calculated, the three-year trap, and what it is really worth to an owner living in the UK.

Inheriting French Property From Abroad: What the Notaire Really Charges in 2026

The 2026 succession tariff run on a €300,000 flat: the three acts you cannot avoid, the partage that triples the bill, the 20 per cent discount nobody mentions, and what changes when the deceased lived in the UK.

Your Tenant Is the Neighbours’ Problem, Which Makes It Yours: What a Landlord Abroad Must Do When the Complaint Arrives

When a tenant disturbs the neighbours, French law holds the owner answerable and expects a precise sequence: evidence, a formal notice, a free conciliation, then termination or non-renewal. The steps, the 1996 ruling that your letters do not shield you, the 2025 law that lets the préfet force your hand, and why the lease’s termination clause only bites after a court has already ruled.

LMP or LMNP When You Sell: the Year of the Sale Decides, With One Tolerance and Two Traps

Is professional furnished-letting status (LMP) judged on the year of the sale or the year before? The year of the sale, says the tax administration, with a filing tolerance for last year's status, an annualisation rule when the sale ends your letting, and a worldwide-income test for non-residents from 2026. Every rule linked to its source.

Buying French Property at a Notarial Auction: the Candle, the Cahier des Charges and the Two Protections You Lose

The notarial auction has no cooling-off period, no loan condition and no negotiation. How the candle works, what the cahier des charges decides, what a bidder from abroad needs on the day, and when immo-interactif is the better room.

The Agent’s Commission: What You Owe a French Estate Agent, and When You Owe Nothing

France hangs an agent’s entire right to payment on a written mandate, a register number and a completed sale. When the commission is owed, who owes it, and the five decades of case law on agents who tried to get paid anyway.

The Foreign Owner’s Tax Map of France: What 47 Expat Towns Really Charge

Official 2025 rates for the 47 French towns where foreign buyers concentrate: a 3.3x spread, the 90% club in the Dordogne, eleven towns with 60% second-home surcharges, and Paris up 50% in five years.

Beyond 90 Days: the Long-Stay Visitor Visa for French Second-Home Owners (2026)

Owning a French home gives you zero right to stay past 90 days. The visitor visa fixes that: VLS-T vs VLS-TS, what the consulate wants to see, the real 2026 costs, and the two clocks - Schengen and tax - that owners most often confuse.

Anatomy of a French Tax Bill: the Avis de Taxe Foncière, Translated Line by Line

France's property-tax bill, decoded box by box on a real anonymised 2025 avis: what every line means in English, how the €1,016 total is built, what to check before paying, and how to contest it.

LMNP Tax Calculator: Micro-BIC vs Régime Réel Break-Even (2026)

A free calculator that shows whether micro-BIC or régime réel leaves you with less taxable income on your French furnished rental, built on the verified 2026 allowances.

How to Raise the Rent on a French Property: A Landlord’s Guide to Revising a Residential Rent

A landlord's guide to the three legal routes for raising a French residential rent: the annual IRL revision, increases after improvement works, and re-pricing an under-valued rent at renewal.