Many foreign buyers discover, sometimes at the signing table, that the Paris flat or Provençal farmhouse they want to buy is not sold in full ownership at all. The seller, often an elderly owner, offers to keep the right to live in the property for the rest of their life while selling only the underlying ownership at a reduced price. Others are advised, usually by a well-meaning intermediary, to buy through a split-ownership structure with children or relatives holding the other half. These arrangements are perfectly lawful under French law and can be excellent value, but they obey rules that have no equivalent in common-law systems and that surprise even experienced international investors. This guide explains how split ownership works, what each side owns, who pays for what, and where foreign buyers most often lose money.
I. What Split Ownership Means for a Foreign Buyer
A. Usufruct and Bare Ownership: the Two Halves of One Property
French law allows ownership of a property to be divided into two complementary rights, a technique known as démembrement de propriété (split ownership). One person holds the usufruit (usufruct, or life interest): the right to use the property and to take its income, for example by living in it or letting it out and keeping the rent. The other holds the nue-propriété (bare ownership): ownership stripped of present use and income, but carrying the right to recover full ownership automatically when the usufruct ends. The holder of the usufruct is the usufruitier (usufructuary); the holder of the bare interest is the nu-propriétaire (bare owner). When the two halves are reunited in the same hands, the property returns to pleine propriété (full ownership).
The starting point is the definition given by the Civil Code: Article 578 of the Civil Code states, “L’usufruit est le droit de jouir des choses dont un autre a la propriété, comme le propriétaire lui-même, mais à la charge d’en conserver la substance.” In other words, the usufructuary may enjoy the property as an owner would, live in it, let it, collect the rents and use the garden, but must preserve its substance and return it, at the end of the usufruct, in a condition consistent with normal use and proper maintenance. This duty to preserve is the thread that runs through every dispute between the two sides, and the Cour de cassation applies it strictly.
A split can be created in several ways. The most common on the open market is a sale in which the seller transfers the bare ownership and reserves a life usufruct for themselves: the buyer pays a discounted price immediately and takes full possession only when the usufruct ends, usually on the death of the seller. Families also create splits deliberately, for example parents keeping the usufruct of a holiday home while transferring the bare ownership to children, or investors acquiring only the bare ownership of new flats while an institutional usufructuary collects the rents for a fixed period. A usufruct can also be temporary, granted for a fixed number of years rather than for life; at expiry the bare owner automatically recovers full ownership. One hard limit matters for corporate structures: Article 619 of the Civil Code provides, “L’usufruit qui n’est pas accordé à des particuliers ne dure que trente ans.” Any usufruct granted to a company or other legal entity, as opposed to a living person, cannot exceed thirty years.
The usufruct ends in the situations listed by Article 617 of the Civil Code: “L’usufruit s’éteint : Par la mort de l’usufruitier ; Par l’expiration du temps pour lequel il a été accordé ; Par la consolidation ou la réunion sur la même tête, des deux qualités d’usufruitier et de propriétaire ; Par le non-usage du droit pendant trente ans ; Par la perte totale de la chose sur laquelle l’usufruit est établi.” Death of the usufructuary is the standard ending for a life usufruct; expiry applies to temporary usufructs; consolidation occurs when one person acquires both halves; and total destruction of the building, for example by fire, extinguishes the usufruct over it. Misconduct can also end it early: Article 618 of the Civil Code allows the courts to terminate a usufruct where the usufructuary abuses enjoyment, stating, “L’usufruit peut aussi cesser par l’abus que l’usufruitier fait de sa jouissance, soit en commettant des dégradations sur le fonds, soit en le laissant dépérir faute d’entretien.” A usufructuary who damages the property or lets it decay through lack of maintenance therefore risks losing the right altogether, a remedy the bare owner should keep in mind when faced with a deteriorating asset.
Because a life usufruct is worth more when the usufructuary is young and less when they are old, French tax law provides a binding valuation scale. Article 669 of the General Tax Code fixes the value of each half as a proportion of the full market value according to the usufructuary’s age: under 21, usufruct 90% and bare ownership 10%; under 31, 80/20; under 41, 70/30; under 51, 60/40; under 61, 50/50; under 71, 40/60; under 81, 30/70; under 91, 20/80; over 91, 10/90. This barème fiscal (statutory valuation scale) governs registration duties and the land-publicity tax, and in practice it anchors price negotiations: a buyer acquiring the bare ownership of a flat worth 600,000 euros in full ownership from a 74-year-old seller will generally pay around 360,000 euros, corresponding to the 60% bare-ownership bracket, while the retained life usufruct accounts for the remaining 40%. The scale is a tax instrument, not a market price list, and parties may agree a different economic split, but any significant departure should be documented and justified, particularly where the tax authorities could later reassess the transaction.
B. How Foreign Buyers Actually Purchase in Split Ownership
In practice, a non-resident buyer meets split ownership in three recurring situations. The first is the purchase of the bare ownership from an elderly seller who reserves a life usufruct, sometimes marketed as a vente en nue-propriété (bare-ownership sale). The buyer pays 40% to 70% of the full value depending on the seller’s age, has no right to occupy or let the property while the seller lives, and becomes full owner automatically on the seller’s death, with no further price to pay and no new transfer deed required. The economic bet is transparent: the longer the usufructuary lives, the lower the buyer’s annualised return, since capital is tied up without income. Buyers should therefore treat the seller’s age as a pricing factor, not a morbid speculation, and have the notaire model several life-expectancy scenarios before signing. Unlike a viager (life-annuity sale), where the buyer pays a lump sum plus a monthly annuity until death, a bare-ownership purchase involves a single payment and no recurring obligation, which makes budgeting simpler but also means the discount is the buyer’s only protection against a long wait.
The second situation is the family structuring purchase, where foreign parents buy a French property and split it immediately, typically keeping the usufruct and giving the bare ownership to their children, or buying through a société civile immobilière (non-trading property company, universally known by its initials SCI) whose shares are themselves split between usufruct and bare ownership. This can suit families who want the parents to keep lifetime control and income while organising the children’s future rights, and it interacts with cross-border inheritance rules that vary sharply between the parents’ home country and France. Because succession and estate planning for foreign families settled in France belong to a different specialty, buyers should keep the two exercises distinct: the conveyancing file organises who owns what today, while a separate estate analysis checks how each half will be treated on death in every relevant jurisdiction. Our Paris real estate team routinely coordinates the property purchase with the client’s home-country advisers so that a structure that is efficient in France does not create an unexpected charge abroad.
The third situation is the institutional temporary-usufruct investment, where a developer or social-housing operator holds a 15- to 20-year usufruct over new flats and sells the bare ownership to private investors at a discount of roughly 30% to 40%. The investor has no rental income and no management burden during the usufruct period, recovers full ownership at term, and can then occupy, let or sell. These schemes suit cash buyers with a long horizon, but the buyer must verify precisely what terminates the usufruct, what condition the flat must be returned in, who bears major works decided during the usufruct period, and whether the usufructuary’s creditors could trouble the arrangement. The thirty-year ceiling of Article 619 is rarely an issue here, but the contract’s allocation of repair costs deserves the same scrutiny as in any private split.
Whatever the configuration, the conveyancing precautions are the same, and they are stricter than for an ordinary purchase. First, financing: French banks are reluctant to lend against bare ownership alone, because the borrower’s asset produces no income and cannot be sold with vacant possession while the usufruct lasts. Most bare-ownership purchases are therefore cash transactions, and a buyer who needs credit should secure the bank’s written agreement on the split structure before signing anything, ideally before the compromis de vente (preliminary sale agreement). Second, due diligence: the notaire must verify thirty years of title deeds, the absence of undisclosed occupants, the co-ownership position, the planning status, and any pre-emption rights, exactly as for a full-ownership purchase, plus the precise legal source and scope of the usufruct. A usufruct created by an old will or a family gift may carry conditions, charges or ambiguities that a fresh contractual usufruct would not. Third, the deeds themselves: French property transfers require a notarial deed published at the land registry (publicité foncière), and private agreements alone do not transfer ownership against third parties.
A recent ruling shows how dangerous informal paperwork can be. On 6 March 2025 the Third Civil Chamber of the Cour de cassation quashed an appeal decision concerning a house where a 1997 private deed purporting to sell full ownership had been followed, in 2002, by a notarial deed selling only the usufruct of the same share (Cass. 3rd civ., 6 March 2025, No. 24-12.122). The court of appeal had treated the later notarial deed as fictitious and the earlier private deed as a perfect sale; the Cour de cassation held that the judges should have investigated whether the published notarial deed embodied the parties’ mutual decision to revoke the earlier private agreement and limit the transfer to the usufruct. For a foreign buyer the lesson is blunt: never rely on side letters, private promises or unregistered understandings about who owns which half, and ensure every step, including any agreed unwinding of an earlier arrangement, is drawn up by the notaire and published. Overlapping deeds with contradictory scopes are a classic source of litigation that a careful file avoids entirely.
Foreign buyers should also budget for the tax picture without treating this article as tax advice. Registration duties on the purchase are computed on the value of the right actually acquired, using the Article 669 scale where applicable. On resale, a non-resident seller’s capital gain on French real estate is taxed in France, with a system of allowances over time and, depending on the seller’s country of residence and the gain at stake, the possible appointment of a représentant fiscal (accredited tax representative). Rental income collected by a usufructuary is taxable in France as property income. Because each half is taxed in the hands of its holder, the overall burden of a split purchase can differ significantly from that of a full-ownership purchase, in either direction. A short consultation with a French tax adviser before the preliminary agreement is signed almost always pays for itself.
II. Living With the Split: Costs, Decisions and Disputes
A. Who Pays for What: Repairs, Charges and Property Tax
The most litigated question in split ownership is also the most practical: when the roof leaks or the boiler fails, who pays. The Code draws the line between routine upkeep and structural work. Article 605 of the Civil Code provides, “L’usufruitier n’est tenu qu’aux réparations d’entretien.” The usufructuary bears only maintenance repairs: servicing the boiler, repainting, replacing worn floor coverings, repairing shutters and interior fittings. Structural work stays with the bare owner, unless the need for it was caused by the usufructuary’s own failure to maintain the property since the usufruct began, in which case the usufructuary contributes as well. Article 606 of the Civil Code defines the structural category narrowly: “Les grosses réparations sont celles des gros murs et des voûtes, le rétablissement des poutres et des couvertures entières.” Major walls and vaults, replacement of beams, complete re-roofing, and the full rebuilding of dykes, retaining walls and boundary walls count as structural; everything else is maintenance.
The Cour de cassation treats the Article 606 list as closed, and buyers should understand exactly what that means. In a leading decision, the Commercial Chamber quashed a ruling that had charged bare owners with demolition works, the reconstruction of a larger dwelling, the building of a swimming pool and landscaping carried out by the usufructuaries (Cass. com., 12 June 2012, No. 11-11.424, published in the Bulletin). The Court recalled the governing principle: “l’usufruitier n’est tenu qu’aux réparations d’entretien et que les grosses réparations demeurent à la charge du propriétaire,” while improvements made by the usufructuary give no right to compensation at the end of the usufruct even if they increased the property’s value. An enthusiastic usufructuary who extends the house, adds a pool or upgrades the land therefore cannot present the bill to the bare owner, either during the usufruct or at its end. Conversely, a bare owner cannot escape genuinely structural work by relabelling it: a complete roof replacement falls squarely on the bare owner, and a usufructuary who advances the cost in an emergency has routes to recover it.
That recovery route was clarified only months ago. On 20 May 2026 the First Civil Chamber ruled on a dispute between a surviving spouse holding one quarter in full ownership plus the usufruct of a house, and her stepson holding the remaining three quarters in bare ownership, over roofing works she had paid for (Cass. 1st civ., 20 May 2026, No. 24-12.274). The court of appeal had applied only the usufruct rules and dismissed her claim; the Cour de cassation quashed, holding that where co-ownership of the property overlaps with the split, the co-ownership rules apply alongside them. The Court recalled that “tout indivisaire peut prendre les mesures nécessaires à la conservation des biens indivis même si elles ne présentent pas un caractère d’urgence” and that a co-owner who spends their own money on necessary conservation works is entitled to compensation. In family splits where one person combines a co-ownership share with a usufruct, a frequent configuration when a parent survives with mixed rights, conservation expenses such as a roof overhaul can therefore be recovered from the bare co-owner under the co-ownership provisions, even though pure usufruct law would not allow the usufructuary to force the bare owner to carry out structural repairs. The decision is also a drafting warning: where a split overlaps with co-ownership, the deeds should state expressly which regime governs which expense, or the parties will litigate it.
A companion question is what happens when the usufructuary is also the occupier and pays for work over many years. In a 2022 decision the First Civil Chamber confirmed that a person who combines the position of occupier with bare ownership cannot reclaim from the usufructuary works that belong to the structural category charged to the bare owner (Cass. 1st civ., 2 March 2022, No. 20-21.641). The judgment treats works falling within structural repairs as charged to the bare owner under Article 605, even when the claimant occupied the house for decades and computed their claim by reference to unpaid rents. Occupation, rent-free or otherwise, does not move the boundary drawn by Articles 605 and 606.
Property tax follows enjoyment, not bare title. Article 1400 of the General Tax Code provides that where a building is burdened with a usufruct, “la taxe foncière est établie au nom de l’usufruitier”. The annual taxe foncière (local property tax) bill is issued to and paid by the usufructuary. A foreign buyer of the bare ownership should therefore not budget for this tax while the usufruct lasts, but should diary its transfer on consolidation: from the year following the end of the usufruct, the full owner pays. Day-to-day co-ownership charges for a flat, routine building maintenance, lift servicing, cleaning and the managing agent’s current budget, are likewise borne by whoever enjoys the property, while exceptional works voted by the general meeting are allocated according to the same structural-versus-maintenance logic, applied to the nature of each item of work. The règlement de copropriété (co-ownership bylaws) and the meeting resolutions should be read line by line before purchase, because a major façade or lift replacement voted during the usufruct can confront the bare owner with a large call for funds years before recovering possession.
Finally, neglect has consequences. A usufructuary who lets the property decay or actively damages it faces the sanction of Article 618 quoted above: the court may declare the usufruct wholly extinguished or order the bare owner back into possession, with or without an annual payment to the former usufructuary depending on the circumstances. Bare owners who notice abandoned maintenance, unauthorised structural alterations or a building left empty and deteriorating should therefore document the condition promptly, preferably by bailiff’s report (constat d’huissier), and seek legal advice before the damage becomes irreversible. Symmetrically, a usufructuary faced with a bare owner who refuses to carry out genuinely structural work that threatens the dwelling should act early: emergency conservation measures, properly documented and notified, are far easier to recover than a collapsed roof.
B. Selling, Letting and Ending the Arrangement
Neither half of a split is frozen: each side can sell, mortgage or give away its own right without the other’s consent, but no dealing by one side can enlarge its rights at the other’s expense. The bare owner may sell the bare ownership to a third party, who simply steps into the same waiting position until the usufruct ends. The usufructuary may sell or give away the usufruct, although in practice a life usufruct is hard to sell except back to the bare owner, which produces a consolidation (merger) and restores full ownership. What neither side can do alone is sell the full property or grant rights exceeding its own share. A lease granted by the usufructuary alone, without the bare owner’s participation, is vulnerable: in a 1986 decision still regularly applied, the Third Civil Chamber annulled a commercial lease granted by a usufructuary without the bare owner’s concurrence, recalling that “l’usufruitier jouit de tous les droits dont le propriétaire jouit et qu’il en jouit comme le propriétaire lui-même” but that acts of disposal beyond enjoyment require both holders (Cass. 3rd civ., 5 March 1986, No. 84-14.147, published in the Bulletin). For a foreign buyer this has an immediate practical consequence: any letting of a split property, whether a long residential lease, a student tenancy or seasonal furnished letting, should be signed or at least expressly approved by both the usufructuary and the bare owner, and any short-term tourist letting additionally requires the municipal authorisation and registration applicable in the commune, particularly in Paris. A tenant who discovers that their lease was granted by only one half-owner may challenge it, and the resulting vacancy and litigation fall hardest on the party counting on the rental income.
Selling a property burdened with a usufruct follows the same logic. The bare owner can sell the bare ownership at any time; the buyer inherits the wait. Joint sale by both holders, usufructuary and bare owner together conveying full ownership to a purchaser with the price apportioned between them, usually by reference to the Article 669 scale for a life usufruct, is the cleanest exit and generally achieves the best price, since the market for unencumbered property is far deeper than the market for bare ownership. Where the holders cannot agree, partition or a court-ordered sale is difficult: unlike ordinary co-ownership, a split cannot simply be divided, and a judge will look first to the deeds and to any contractual exit mechanism the parties agreed at the outset. This is one more reason to negotiate, at the purchase stage, a written agreement between usufructuary and bare owner covering works, insurance, letting, sale cooperation and first-refusal rights. Such a convention d’usufruit (usufruct agreement) costs little to draft and prevents most of the disputes described in this guide.
Foreign families holding French property through an SCI face a parallel set of rules at company level when the company’s shares are themselves split. The usufructuary of shares is not a shareholder: on 16 February 2022 the Third Civil Chamber confirmed that the quality of associé (shareholder) belongs to the bare owner alone, while the usufructuary may demand that the manager convene the shareholders on any question directly affecting their enjoyment (Cass. 3rd civ., 16 February 2022, No. 20-15.164). The Court stated, “l’usufruitier de parts sociales ne peut se voir reconnaître la qualité d’associé, qui n’appartient qu’au nu-propriétaire,” adding that the usufructuary must nevertheless be able to provoke a shareholders’ decision on matters with a direct impact on the right of enjoyment. Two years later the same Chamber went further and struck down company bylaws that tried to silence usufructuaries, holding that the statutes of a property company cannot deprive the usufructuary of shares of the right to challenge a collective decision likely to affect their enjoyment directly (Cass. 3rd civ., 11 July 2024, No. 23-10.013). For parents who keep the usufruct of SCI shares while children hold the bare ownership, the message is twofold: the parents keep real powers, including dividends and a protected voice on decisions touching their enjoyment, but the children alone vote as shareholders, and any clause attempting to lock the usufructuary out of challenges is unenforceable. Family SCI bylaws should therefore allocate voting rights expressly, distinguish decisions on profits from decisions on capital, and provide a mediation mechanism before disputes reach the courts. Further detail on company-based holdings is a company-law matter, but the property consequences, who occupies, who pays, who can sell, remain governed by the principles set out above.
Ending the split, finally, takes one of the paths listed in Article 617: death of the usufructuary, expiry of a fixed term, merger of both halves in one person, thirty years of non-use, or total loss of the property. On death, consolidation is automatic and requires no deed, although the land registry entry should be updated and the tax position closed properly. Expiry of a temporary usufruct likewise restores full ownership by operation of law, subject to settling the final accounts for works and charges. Early termination by agreement is always possible and should be recorded by the notaire with the appropriate tax filings. Judicial termination for abuse under Article 618 remains the remedy of last resort where one side destroys value. In every case, the incoming full owner should commission a fresh condition survey at handover: thirty years of another person’s maintenance choices, however lawful, rarely match a new owner’s expectations, and the Article 606 boundary will decide who pays for the gap.
Conclusion
Split ownership is one of French property law’s most useful instruments for foreign buyers: it opens discounted entry prices, organises family control across generations, and funds long-horizon investments without rental-management burdens. It is also unforgiving of approximation. The usufructuary enjoys almost everything but owns nothing and must preserve the substance; the bare owner owns everything but enjoys nothing and pays for the structure; the tax scale fixes values the market must respect; and the courts enforce the boundary between maintenance and structural work, between enjoyment and disposal, and between shareholder and usufructuary with a consistency built over decades and reaffirmed as recently as May 2026. A buyer who verifies the source of the usufruct, prices the wait realistically, allocates works and taxes in writing, involves both holders in every lease and sale, and publishes every deed will find the démembrement a secure and profitable tool. A buyer who treats a bare-ownership purchase like an ordinary discounted flat, or who relies on informal understandings with the other half-owner, is buying a dispute along with the property. Before committing, put the deeds, the age scale, the works allocation and the exit routes on one page, and have a practitioner who handles Franco-foreign files review it. For tailored guidance on structuring, conveyancing or disputes, the team’s background and contact details are presented on our Paris real estate law page.
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