This article is general information for foreign owners of French property, not tax or legal advice. Eligibility and amounts depend on your own circumstances and on rules that change with each finance law. Before you commit to a six-year letting convention, confirm the current position with the ANAH and a qualified French tax adviser.
Last Updated: June 2026
Here is a French tax break that sounds almost too generous to be real: agree to let an unfurnished home at a rent below the local market, sign a six-year deal with the housing agency, and the State hands you back between 15% and 65% of your gross rent as a straight reduction off your income-tax bill. It is called Loc’Avantages (the successor to the old Louer abordable scheme), it was reopened by the 2026 finance law after a brief suspension, and it runs to the end of 2027. The catch, and there is a real one for this blog’s readers, is hiding in the very first line of the law – so let’s deal with that before anything else.
First, the part that decides it for most foreign owners
The Loc’Avantages tax reduction lives in article 199 tricies of the Code general des impots, and that article reserves the benefit to “les contribuables domicilies en France au sens de l’article 4 B” – taxpayers who are fiscally resident in France. It is a reduction d’impot (a credit against French income tax), and the gate is French tax residence at the moment the ANAH convention takes effect.
But – and this is the part worth reading twice – that is the rule for starting the scheme, not for keeping it. As impots.gouv.fr confirms in guidance refreshed in March 2026, since 1 January 2022 a non-resident can continue to claim the Loc’Avantages reduction provided the convention took effect before the date they moved abroad. The residence test bites when you sign, not for every year afterwards.
Sorted by who you are:
- You live in France (whatever your nationality): the scheme is fully open, and this section is for you. The planning point worth flagging: if you set up a Loc’Avantages convention now, while resident, and later move abroad, you keep the reduction for the rest of the six-year term – genuinely useful if a return home or a posting elsewhere is on the horizon.
- You are already a non-resident, with a convention you signed while you still lived in France: it continues. You did not forfeit the benefit by leaving.
- You are already a non-resident and want to start a fresh convention from abroad: as a rule, you cannot – the reduction needs French domicile at the convention’s effective date. The one narrow door is the non-resident Schumacker rule (named after the EU Court of Justice case): if you are resident in another EU or EEA state and at least 75% of your worldwide income comes from French sources, France must treat you broadly like a resident, which can bring the reduction within reach.
So the honest headline turns on timing. Set Loc’Avantages up while you live in France and the tax break travels with you when you leave. Try to start it once you are already abroad and, the Schumacker case aside, the door is shut. If France is home today, read on – the numbers are genuinely good.
What Loc’Avantages actually is
Strip away the acronyms and Loc’Avantages is a bargain struck between a landlord and the State. You agree to let a home at a controlled, below-market rent to a tenant of modest means, for at least six years, under a convention signed with the Agence nationale de l’habitat (ANAH – the national housing agency). In exchange, you get a reduction straight off your income tax, scaled to how far below the market you set the rent: the deeper the discount to your tenant, the bigger the cut to your tax.
A few framing points before the detail. The reduction is calculated on your gross rental income and comes off the tax you owe, not off your taxable base – so it is worth real money, not just a smaller bill to be taxed on. The scheme replaced the older Louer abordable (whose conventions still run their course), and it was extended to 31 December 2027 by article 88 of the 2025 finance law. Its application window then closed briefly at the turn of the year, while France’s delayed 2026 budget was still in limbo, and reopened once the 2026 finance law was promulgated on 19 February 2026. And it does not stack: you cannot combine Loc’Avantages with another rental-investment incentive such as Denormandie on the same property.
The conditions you have to meet
The deal comes with a checklist, and all of it has to hold for the life of the convention. To qualify you must:
- let the home unfurnished (this is a location nue scheme – a furnished let does not qualify, which is the fork away from the furnished-letting LMNP route);
- set a rent below the local market, at one of three defined levels (more on those below);
- let to a tenant who will use it as their main residence, and whose income sits under the State’s resource ceilings;
- not let to a member of your own household or close family;
- commit for a minimum of six years under the ANAH convention (nine years if you take ANAH funding for renovation works);
- and not let a DPE F or G home – grades A to E are eligible, but a passoire thermique (thermal sieve) is out, which dovetails with the wider energy-rating ban creeping through the rental market.
One useful sweetener sits alongside the rules: if the home needs work before it can be let, Loc’Avantages can come with an ANAH renovation grant, the size depending on the works. The trade-offs: going down the works route lengthens your letting commitment to nine years, the home must reach at least a DPE grade D once the works are finished, and you must run the project through Mon Accompagnateur Renov’, the State’s mandatory renovation-advice channel.
The three rent levels, and what each is worth
The whole scheme turns on one choice: how far below the market you are willing to set the rent. There are three rungs, and the further you drop, the larger your tax reduction. On top of that, you can boost the reduction by letting through intermediation locative – handing the tenancy to a State-approved social letting agency or association, which takes the management (and much of the risk) off your hands.
| Rent level | Rent vs local market | Tax reduction, letting it yourself | Tax reduction, via a social agency (intermediation) |
|---|---|---|---|
| Loc1 | 15% below market | 15% | 20% |
| Loc2 | 30% below market | 35% | 40% |
| Loc3 | 45% below market | not available without intermediation | 65% |
To see what that is worth, take a flat you let for a gross 8,000 euros a year at the Loc2 level through a social agency (a 40% reduction): that is 3,200 euros knocked straight off your income tax, every year of the convention, in return for charging 30% under the market rent. Whether the maths works for you depends on the gap between the capped rent and what you could otherwise charge, but in high-rent cities where the discount is calculated off a high market reference, the trade can be surprisingly close to neutral – and a good deal kinder on void periods and arrears if you go through an agency.
Two practical notes. First, the exact rent ceilings and tenant-income limits are local: the ANAH runs a simulator where you enter the address, postcode and floor area and it returns the maximum rent for each of Loc1, Loc2 and Loc3, plus the tenant resource ceilings. Run it before you decide anything. Second, if you go down the intermediation route at Loc2 or Loc3, there is a one-off bonus on top of the annual reduction: 1,000 euros for a letting or sub-letting mandate, 2,000 euros for a full management mandate, and a further 1,000 euros if the home is 40 m² or smaller.
Loc’Avantages, Jeanbrun, or plain letting?
Loc’Avantages is not the only “cap your rent, cut your tax” bargain in the French system, and it helps to see where it sits. Its closest cousin is the new amortisation regime for unfurnished letting: the Jeanbrun route lets you depreciate the property itself against rent in exchange for capped rents and a long commitment, which suits a higher-value purchase you intend to hold. Loc’Avantages, by contrast, is a direct reduction off tax tied to how affordable you make the rent, and it shines on a modest, already-owned home you are happy to let cheaply for six years. The two are different tools for different situations, and neither is the furnished-letting LMNP path, which trades all of this for the simplicity and depreciation of a furnished let.
The honest summary: if you are French-resident, own an unfurnished home, and can live with a below-market rent and a six-year tie, Loc’Avantages is one of the more rewarding things in the code – especially at Loc2 or Loc3 through an agency. If any of those three conditions is missing, one of the alternatives is probably the better fit.
How to apply
The process runs through the ANAH, not your tax office. You build and submit your file on the ANAH’s dedicated online platform; the request has to be registered between 1 March 2022 and 31 December 2027, the window the scheme currently runs to. The convention then fixes your rent level, your obligations and the six-year clock, and the tax reduction flows through your annual French income-tax return for each year of the let. Because the 2026 finance law only reopened the window in February, it is worth confirming the live state of the ANAH guichet before you build a plan around it – the agency was still updating its own pages in the spring.
The bottom line
Loc’Avantages is a genuinely generous scheme – a 15% to 65% reduction off your income tax for letting an unfurnished home below market for six years – with a timing gate rather than a flat one: you have to be tax-resident in France when the convention takes effect, but you keep the benefit if you later move abroad. For foreign owners who live in France, that makes it well worth a look, particularly at the deeper Loc2 and Loc3 levels through a social letting agency, and worth setting up before any move abroad rather than after. For those already non-resident, a fresh start is generally out of reach (the Schumacker case aside), though an existing convention signed in your resident years carries on. Either way, the ANAH simulator is the five-minute first step that tells you whether the numbers are anywhere near working for your home.
Frequently asked questions
Can a non-resident landlord claim the Loc’Avantages tax reduction?
It depends on timing. To start a new convention you generally need to be fiscally resident in France (or a “non-resident Schumacker” – resident in another EU or EEA state with at least 75% of worldwide income from French sources). But once a convention has taken effect while you were resident, you keep the reduction after moving abroad: since 1 January 2022, impots.gouv.fr confirms a non-resident retains the Loc’Avantages reduction provided the convention took effect before their departure.
How much is the Loc’Avantages tax reduction?
It ranges from 15% to 65% of your gross rental income, depending on how far below market you set the rent and whether you let through a social agency. Letting it yourself: 15% at Loc1, 35% at Loc2. Through intermediation locative: 20% at Loc1, 40% at Loc2, and 65% at Loc3 (Loc3 requires intermediation).
Does the property have to be unfurnished?
Yes. Loc’Avantages is a location nue (unfurnished-letting) scheme. A furnished let does not qualify and would instead fall under the furnished-letting regimes such as LMNP.
How long does the Loc’Avantages commitment last?
At least six years under a convention signed with the ANAH, or nine years if you take ANAH funding for renovation works. The rent stays capped at your chosen level and the tenant must use the home as their main residence throughout.
Is Loc’Avantages still available in 2026?
Yes, in principle. The scheme runs to 31 December 2027, and its application window, suspended at the start of 2026, reopened following the 2026 finance law (promulgated 19 February 2026). Because the reopening was recent, confirm the ANAH guichet is live on the agency’s own platform before you build a plan around it.
Can I combine it with other landlord tax schemes?
No. Loc’Avantages cannot be combined on the same property with other rental-investment incentives such as Denormandie.
