New tough tax rules apply on French holiday rentals from 2025

New tougher tax rules on furnished holiday rentals and chambres d’hôtes will start for income earned in 2025.

The new ‘Meur law’, voted through by MPs, sets these out and also states that the old familiar rules will remain in place for income from 2024.

A previous set of new holiday rental rules from the 2024 finance law, reportedly adopted by MPs in error, have, therefore, gone. These had previously been expected to apply to income from 2024, which is declared in spring 2025.

The latter varied according to whether a property was in an area deemed subject to housing pressure or not, whether it was ‘classified’ under the star-rating scheme, and how much turn-over it generated.

These new changes all relate to property owners who, as is common, declare income under the micro-Bic system, which avoids complex accounting through use of fixed expense allowances.

Compared to the old rules, the Meur law applies reduced benefits for all furnished holiday rentals, eg. gîtes and Air­bnb properties, whether a property is classified or not.

They do not refer to whether a property is in an ‘under pressure’ area. The rules are:

• 50% allowance for classified holiday rentals and for chambres d’hôtes within a micro-Bic ceiling of €77,700 turnover; down from 71% and €188,700 in the old rules;
• Otherwise, a 30% allowance within a limit of €15,000, down from 50% and €77,700 before.

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'Still too generous'

The Meur law was put forward on a cross-party basis by an MP from President Mac­ron’s group in parliament, Annaïg Le Meur, and a socialist MP, Inaki Achaniz.

Mr Achaniz described the passing of the law as a “victory” but said the rules for classified rentals were still “too generous”, as he wants the same rules to apply to all short-term rentals and long-term rentals.

The latter benefit from a micro-foncier allowance of 30% within a ceiling of €15,000.

Mr Achaniz wants to encourage more people to rent out their property as main homes.

However, the Senate was strongly opposed to any further reduction in the holiday rental advantages.

Some MPs have supported an amendment to the 2025 finance law, raising the micro-foncier allowance to 50%, but this is not certain to be passed.

Further rules

The Meur law also included further rules about holiday rentals, including an obligation for all properties to have at least a D rating for energy efficiency by 2034. Properties can be rated A to G, so this places pressure on many owners to have works done or to stop renting their homes out.

Communes will also be able to vote, if they wish and explain their reasons, to lower the maximum number of days per year that a person’s main residence can be rented out to tourists to 90 days, from 120 days at present. This already applies in some cities.

Communes in ‘under pressure’ areas and/or having more than 20% of properties used for short-term holiday rentals will also be allowed to set quotas for how many holiday rental properties are allowed on their territory, and to designate areas that must be only for main homes.

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Finally, anyone doing any holiday rental at all must in future declare this with their mairie and be registered with it.

At present, neither is required for part-time rental of one’s own main home and many areas require only a declaration, not a ‘registration’, which permits mairies to ask for extra documents.

However, all furnished holiday rental properties will be given a registration number by May 20, 2026.