Letting furnished in France when you live abroad

What is the LMNP status, and who falls under it?

Letting furnished is not letting unfurnished, and the difference is not one of decoration: it is a difference of tax nature. Rent from an unfurnished let is property income; rent from a furnished let is industrial and commercial profit, because the law considers that providing an equipped home is a commercial activity. Everything follows from that: the tax regime, the deductible expenses, the formalities, and the fate of the capital gain on resale.

The non-professional furnished landlord status, which everyone calls LMNP, is the one that applies by default. You leave it, becoming a professional landlord, when two conditions are met at the same time: annual receipts from the activity exceed 23,000 euros, and they exceed the household's other professional income. One alone is not enough. For a non-resident whose professional income is abroad, the second condition is assessed on the household's total income, which makes the switch rarer than people think.

A furnished let, in tax terms, is not a home with furniture in it: it is a decent home equipped with a list of items set by decree, sufficient for a tenant to sleep, eat and live properly. Bedding, hob, oven, fridge, crockery, utensils, table, seating, storage, lighting, cleaning equipment. A single missing item lets the tenant have the lease reclassified as an unfurnished let, with retroactive effect on the tax regime.

What formalities before letting furnished?

Letting furnished, even a single studio, means carrying on a commercial activity in tax terms. That entails formalities unknown to unfurnished letting, and they are done online, from abroad, without travelling.

1. Declare the start of activity at the single business formalities portal, within fifteen days of the letting beginning. It is this declaration that issues the SIRET number, without which no BIC income return is possible.
2. Choose your regime. Micro-BIC applies by default below the thresholds; the actual regime must be requested, and the option is exercised within the prescribed deadlines, which differ depending on whether the activity is starting or continuing.
3. Declare the tourist let at the town hall, where short-term letting is involved. A simple declaration in most municipalities, a change-of-use authorisation in tight-housing areas, sometimes with compensation to provide.
4. Obtain a classification if you are targeting the classified-let regime. The visit is carried out by an accredited body and the classification lasts five years.
5. Budget for the business property contribution. It is due from the first full year of activity, and the initial return is filed before the end of the starting year.
6. Declare income each year on the supplementary return for non-salaried occupations, with the non-residents tax office.

An accredited tax representative is no longer compulsory for residents of the European Union, the European Economic Area and a few states bound to France by a recovery assistance treaty. For the others, the administration may require one, in practice mainly on a sale. It is a question to ask before buying, not at the point of selling.

On what conditions does the status apply, and when do you leave it?

The status is not a box you tick: it is observed. You are a non-professional furnished lessor as long as two conditions hold together, and you leave it the day they stop, with no formality and sometimes without knowing. The switch changes how rents are taxed and above all how the resale gain is taxed.

The two thresholds of article 155 of the General Tax Code are read together, never apart: crossing 23,000 euros of receipts is not enough to become professional if your other earned income stays higher. For a non-resident whose salary lands abroad, this second test is computed on the household's income, including income not taxed in France.

What do income tax and social levies cost on furnished rents?

A principle first, which lifts most of the worry: property located in France is taxed in France, whatever the owner's residence. Every tax treaty signed by France gives the right to tax property income to the state where the building stands. So you declare your rent in France, and your country of residence then applies its own method to avoid you paying twice: either it exempts this income, or it taxes it while granting you a tax credit equal to the French tax.

On the amount, a rule specific to non-residents applies: the minimum tax rate. Tax cannot be lower than 20 % of net taxable income up to 29,315 euros, and 30 % above, whatever the ordinary scale would produce. That floor can be lifted, and it is the step many overlook: if you demonstrate that the average rate applying to all your worldwide income, French and foreign, is below that minimum, it is that average rate that applies. The evidence is supplied with the return, by declaring worldwide income for information.

This is the easiest saving to miss, and it is worth nearly ten points. The full rate of social charges on investment income is 17.2 %. But since the European case law forbidding a person from contributing twice to two social security systems, people affiliated to a compulsory scheme in another European Economic Area state, Switzerland or the United Kingdom are exempt from most of it: they owe only the solidarity levy, at 7.5 %.

The exemption is not automatic: it must be claimed, by ticking the box on the return and keeping your foreign fund's affiliation certificate available. It depends neither on nationality nor on where you live, but on the social security scheme you actually contribute to. A French employee in Geneva qualifies; a French retiree in Bangkok, affiliated to a French scheme, does not; an American in New York does not, the United States not being in the European Economic Area.

On a profit of 12,000 euros, the gap between 17.2 % and 7.5 % represents 1,164 euros a year. Over ten years of ownership, it exceeds the cumulative cost of an accountant. It is the first thing a partner used to non-residents checks, and the first thing self-filed returns forget.

Which deadlines and due dates set the rhythm of a furnished letting?

Three due dates matter, and two of them are easily missed from abroad because no reminder is ever sent. The first conditions the very existence of your activity, the other two govern the tax.

Opting for the actual-cost regime is the decision with the heaviest consequences, and it is a calendar decision before it is a tax decision: taken too late, it does not recover the year gone by. On a recently acquired property, where depreciation is highest, a missed year is never regained.

What does non-residence change about the taxation of rents?

The principle first, because it often surprises: rents from a property located in France are taxable in France, whatever your tax residence, and tax treaties do not unsettle that. What your country of residence then decides is how to avoid double taxation, not France's right to tax.

The 20 % minimum rate is not inevitable: article 197 A of the General Tax Code lets you evidence that the average rate resulting from all your worldwide income would be lower, and have it applied. That means declaring that worldwide income to the French authority, which does not make it taxable there.

What should be checked before putting a property into furnished letting?

Three sets of rules can forbid what tax law allows, and none of the three sits in the General Tax Code. Checking them costs an hour; discovering them afterwards costs a reinstatement and sometimes a fine.

The order matters: the co-ownership rules override the municipal authorisation, and the municipal authorisation is worth nothing if the home does not meet the energy-decency threshold. Checking in the other direction spends on formalities what one clause of the rules would have saved.

What risks does a furnished-letting landlord carry from abroad?

The tax risk is real but it can be repaired: a reassessment is paid and settled. The two risks that cannot be repaired lie elsewhere, in a reclassification of the regime and in vacancy, and both build up years in advance without ever signalling themselves.

The costliest risk does not materialise during the letting but on resale, and it is the direct counterpart of the actual-cost regime's advantage: since the 2025 reform, depreciation deducted while holding the property is added back into the capital-gain computation. The annual tax saving is therefore not a net gain, it is a deferral whose running total must be kept.

Micro-BIC or actual-expenses regime: how do you choose?

Two regimes exist, and the choice is not a matter of taste: it is calculated. Micro-BIC applies a flat-rate allowance to receipts and requires no accounting. The actual-expenses regime deducts costs genuinely paid and, above all, depreciation of the property and the furniture, which often wipes out the entire taxable profit for years. It does, however, require accounts kept by a professional.

The practical rule is read in the gap between the allowance and your actual costs. If your costs, loan interest and depreciation exceed the flat-rate allowance, the actual regime wins, and it wins by a wide margin as soon as there is a loan running or recent works. If the property is paid for outright, old, lightly charged and let below the threshold, micro-BIC is enough and costs less in accounting fees. For an unclassified tourist let, the question barely arises since 2025: with a 30 % allowance and a 15,000 euro threshold, the actual regime prevails in almost every case.

Depreciation under the actual regime has a limit many discover late: it cannot create a loss. The portion of depreciation exceeding the profit is not lost, it is carried forward without time limit against the following years' profits. The outcome is the same in the long run, but the timetable is not the one people picture.

What has changed for tourist lettings, classification included?

The act of 19 November 2024, known as the Le Meur act, deeply changed the economics of furnished tourist letting. It pursues a stated objective: reducing the tax gap that made short-term letting more profitable than year-round letting in areas where housing is scarce. Three changes directly concern a non-resident owner.

1. The micro-BIC allowance collapses for unclassified lets. It drops from 50 to 30 %, and the receipts threshold from 77,700 to 15,000 euros, for income received from 2025. An owner collecting 30,000 euros of seasonal rent on an unclassified property therefore leaves micro-BIC and switches to the actual regime, whether they want to or not.
2. Classification becomes an economic lever. A classified tourist let keeps a 50 % allowance and a 77,700 euro threshold. Classification is obtained from an accredited body, for five years, and the visit is prepared for: it is now a calculation, not an affectation.
3. Municipalities gain powers. They may lower to ninety days a year the maximum letting period for a primary residence, introduce quotas of authorisations, impose compensation, and define areas reserved for housing. The rule is now read municipality by municipality, never nationally.

For an owner living abroad, the practical consequence is twofold. First, a property bought before 2025 on a seasonal yield assumption no longer returns the same, and the calculation deserves redoing. Second, the local rule prevails: before buying in a tourist municipality, you must read its regulations, because the change-of-use authorisation may be refused, capped or conditional on compensation.

Until 2025 the question was one of comfort: a classification reassured guests and opened a few local schemes. Since the micro-BIC allowance fell to 30 % for unclassified lets and stayed at 50 % for classified ones, the question has become arithmetical, and the answer is calculated in a few minutes.

Classification is a voluntary procedure: you apply to an accredited body, which visits the property and awards one to five stars against a grid of criteria covering equipment, floor area, accessibility and service. The classification lasts five years. It does not require a luxurious property: one star is enough to switch into the favourable regime, and many decent furnished lets obtain it without works, simply by completing their equipment.

Classification does not always win. When the property is financed by a loan or has just been renovated, the actual regime often erases more than a 50 % allowance, and classification becomes secondary in tax terms, even if it remains commercially useful. The right way to decide is to have both calculations set out by a partner accountant before the first season, not after.

What happens on the resale of a furnished let?

This is the heaviest change of recent years, and the one that renders most pre-2025 projections obsolete. For a long time the actual regime offered furnished landlords a singular advantage: they depreciated the property each year, which erased tax on the rent, and that depreciation was not clawed back when calculating the capital gain on resale. The 2025 finance act ended that double benefit.

Since 15 February 2025, depreciation deducted during the letting is reintegrated into the capital gain calculation: it reduces the acquisition price, and so increases the taxable gain by the same amount. In practice, the tax saved each year is no longer acquired, it is deferred until the sale. The mechanism remains advantageous, because tax deferred by fifteen years is worth less than tax paid straight away, and because the holding-period allowances continue to apply; but the advantage is no longer what people think.

Some managed residences remain outside this reintegration, notably student residences and establishments housing elderly or dependent people. For a standard property, by contrast, the rule applies in full. The rest of the non-resident's capital gain calculation does not change: the holding-period allowance erases income tax after twenty-two years and social charges after thirty, and an exemption is possible within the limit provided for a former resident selling their former home in France.

The practical consequence fits in one sentence: the actual regime is no longer chosen for the immediate tax saving alone, but with a holding period in view. The longer you keep the property, the more the deferral works in your favour and the more the allowances erase the clawback. A resale at five years changes the calculation entirely.

Furnished or unfurnished: what does the choice really change for a non-resident?

For an owner who lives far away, reading this table is not only about tax. Furnished letting earns more and is taxed less, but it takes far more managing: more turnover, more inventories, more restoration between tenants, more furniture to replace. It is a trade-off between yield and mental load, and it is almost always settled by first deciding who will look after the property on site.

Which mistakes cost the most?

1. Declaring furnished rent as property income. The most widespread mistake, and it closes off depreciation while exposing you to a reassessment.
2. Forgetting to claim the 7.5 % rate on social charges. The exemption is never automatic: it has to be ticked, and it is worth nearly ten points every year.
3. Not obtaining a SIRET number. Without a start-of-activity declaration at the single portal within fifteen days, no BIC return is possible and the activity is irregular.
4. Staying on micro-BIC with a loan running. Interest and depreciation almost always exceed the flat-rate allowance: the actual regime is then the only rational option.
5. Letting as a tourist rental without checking the municipality's rules. Since the act of 19 November 2024, quotas, authorisations and compensation are decided locally, and an irregular let stops overnight.
6. Basing your yield calculation on a pre-2025 projection. The unclassified allowance fell from 50 to 30 %, and depreciation is now clawed back on resale: both starting assumptions have changed.

What does French Realty do on your furnished letting, and what does it not do?

A non-resident's furnished letting puts two worlds to work that do not talk to each other: tax, settled once a year on a return, and the ground, settled every week in the property. French Realty holds both ends. We frame your situation and direct you to a partner accountant, who alone advises and files, under their own responsibility. And your dedicated concierge handles what happens on site, because that is our execution business.

The tax side: frame, then direct

A first conversation establishes what decides everything: your country of residence and your social security scheme, the type of letting envisaged, the level of receipts expected, whether there is a loan, and the holding period in mind. We then introduce you to a partner accountant used to non-resident landlords: they are the one who compares micro-BIC and the actual regime on your figures, who exercises the option, who declares the start of activity and who keeps the accounts. The introduction is offered; their fees are set and invoiced by them.

The ground side: what we carry out ourselves

A furnished let has to be maintained. Your dedicated concierge equips the home to the regulatory list, photographs the inventory, attends the check-in and check-out, coordinates restoration between tenants, replaces worn furniture and carries out inspection visits. These are execution tasks, individually quoted by time spent, and they are what makes furnished letting from ten thousand kilometres away sustainable.

What we do not do, and which belongs to others: advising on the choice of tax regime, preparing or signing a return, guaranteeing a yield. French Realty informs, directs and coordinates; the partner accountant advises and files; regulated letting management belongs to a manager holding the professional licence.