The English Investor is the go-to English-language resource for foreign property investors in France. Written by a tri-qualified lawyer, our guides cover legal structures, tax strategy, rental regulations, and practical advice for buying and managing French real estate.
Own a French property and let it stand empty and crumbling? A commune can expropriate it on a fast-track procedure - and on 22 May 2026 the Conseil constitutionnel confirmed that procedure is constitutional.
Fake tax notices are a common rental-application scam. France gives landlords two free, official ways to check a tenant's avis d'imposition is genuine - the 2D-Doc barcode and the SVAIR online tool.
Own a French property and let it stand empty and crumbling? A commune can expropriate it on a fast-track procedure - and on 22 May 2026 the Conseil constitutionnel confirmed that procedure is constitutional.
Fake tax notices are a common rental-application scam. France gives landlords two free, official ways to check a tenant's avis d'imposition is genuine - the 2D-Doc barcode and the SVAIR online tool.
Own a French property and let it stand empty and crumbling? A commune can expropriate it on a fast-track procedure - and on 22 May 2026 the Conseil constitutionnel confirmed that procedure is constitutional.
Fake tax notices are a common rental-application scam. France gives landlords two free, official ways to check a tenant's avis d'imposition is genuine - the 2D-Doc barcode and the SVAIR online tool.
Letting your own French home for a few weeks a year is legal, but tightly framed. Here are the 2026 rules: the 120-day cap, the new nationwide registration, and the tax that follows.
Can a creditor force-sell your French home over a debt that is small next to its value? On 21 May 2026 the Cour de cassation reset how judges must answer - and it cuts both ways.
France has revived property amortisation for the first time in a generation. Here is how the new Jeanbrun (Relance logement) regime lets landlords - residents and non-residents alike - write down up to 80% of a flat's price against their rental income.
The Loi de Finances 2026 has ended a long-standing French quirk: non-resident landlords previously qualified for LMP status because only French-source income was compared against rental receipts. From 1 January 2026, foreign income now counts — pushing many non-resident owners back to LMNP, with material CGT consequences.
The Cour de cassation has ruled that a student internship — even one embedded in a university curriculum — does not count as a 'professional obligation' for the purposes of the 120-day annual cap on tourism rentals of a French primary residence. We unpack what the 16 April 2026 ruling closes off, what it leaves intact, and how it interacts with the Loi Le Meur tightening.
A field guide to the IRS reporting stack — FBAR, Form 8938, Form 8865, Schedule E, Foreign Tax Credit — that US persons take on the moment they buy French property, with the SCI classification puzzle and the post-2019 CSG/CRDS creditability under LB&I-04-0819-007.
France raised CSG on capital income by 1.4 points on 1 January 2026 — but bare rental and real-estate gains were specifically exempted, while LMNP got hit. And UK-resident landlords with the right A1 or S1 paperwork can pay just 7.5% on every euro of net rental income, an 11-point saving most British landlords have never been told about.