You own a flat in Paris, a house in the Dordogne or a studio on the Riviera, you hold a British passport, and the idea of letting it furnished to holidaymakers looks like an easy way to cover the taxe foncière (the French annual property tax) and keep a foot in France after Brexit. That income is lawful, and many British owners earn it every year. But since Brexit, and even more since the Act of 19 November 2024 that tightened the rules on tourist furnished lets (the so-called “Airbnb Act”), short-term furnished letting has become one of the most regulated activities a private owner can carry on in France. Registration numbers, day-count limits, change-of-use authorisations, compensation in large cities, a harsher micro-tax regime, social charges and platform reporting all apply to you in exactly the same way as to a French owner: nationality changes nothing here. What Brexit does change is your right to stay in France to manage the property, your tax residence position, and the paperwork you must keep on both sides of the Channel.
This guide answers two practical questions. First, how do you lawfully register and let a French home as a furnished tourist rental, and when does a large city such as Paris require a separate change-of-use authorisation? Second, how is that rental income taxed in France and in the United Kingdom, and how do you challenge a fine or a tax bill if one lands on your doormat in London? Throughout, every French term is explained, and every decisive legal statement is tied to the official text or court decision it comes from.
I. How do you lawfully register and let a French home as a furnished tourist rental after Brexit?
A. How do you declare the letting, and what does the 120-day limit mean for you?
A meublé de tourisme (furnished tourist accommodation) is defined by statute as a furnished villa, flat or studio, for the exclusive use of the guest, offered to a passing clientele who do not take up residence there and whose stay is characterised by a letting by the day, the week or the month. That definition matters because it draws the line between an ordinary residential tenancy, governed by the Act of 6 July 1989 on landlord and tenant relations, and a short-term tourist activity governed by the Tourism Code (code du tourisme). If your guests stay for days or weeks and keep their real home elsewhere, you are in the second category, and the declaration duties described below apply to you before the first guest arrives.
Before offering the property, you must personally make a declaration that is subject to registration on a national online service (“téléservice national”). The governing text, Article L. 324-1-1 of the Tourism Code, in its version in force since 20 May 2026, provides in its own words:
“Toute personne qui offre à la location un meublé de tourisme procède préalablement en personne à une déclaration soumise à enregistrement auprès d’un téléservice national opéré par l’organisme public unique mentionné au premier alinéa du II de l’article L. 324-2-1.”
In plain English: every person who offers a tourist furnished let must first declare it in person on the single national portal. The declaration states whether the property is your main residence (résidence principale, within the meaning of Article 2 of the Act of 6 July 1989), and if so you must prove it, typically with an income-tax notice showing that address. On receipt of a complete file, the portal immediately issues an electronic acknowledgement carrying a declaration number (numéro de déclaration), which is passed to the commune (municipality) where the property sits. You must update the declaration whenever the information changes and renew it when it expires. The English-language service-public.fr guide to turning a second home into a holiday furnished let walks through the same steps and confirms that the registration number must appear in every rental advertisement, including advertisements carried on online platforms.
Platforms such as Airbnb or Booking.com are not passive billboards. Under Article L. 324-2-1 of the Tourism Code, anyone who assists, for payment or free of charge, through brokerage or through a digital platform, in letting a tourist furnished unit must inform you of the declaration or authorisation duties, obtain from you before publication a signed statement (attestation sur l’honneur) that you have complied, together with the declaration number and whether the unit is your main residence, and must publish that number in every advertisement. If you let through a platform and it never asked for your number, that is a warning sign, not a favour: the platform is itself under duties, and your advertisement without a number is precisely what municipal control teams search for.
The famous 120-day rule applies only to your main residence. Article L. 324-1-1, IV states, again in its own words:
“Toute personne qui offre à la location un meublé de tourisme qui est déclaré comme sa résidence principale ne peut le faire au-delà de cent vingt jours au cours d’une même année civile, sauf obligation professionnelle, raison de santé ou cas de force majeure.”
So if you live in the flat as your main home, you may let it for no more than 120 days per calendar year, except for professional obligations, health reasons or force majeure. The municipality may, by reasoned decision, lower that ceiling to 90 days. It may also, until 31 December of the year following any letting year, ask you to report how many days the unit was let, whether or not it is your main residence, and you must reply within one month, giving the address and the declaration number. If the property is your second home (résidence secondaire), the 120-day cap does not apply — but something stricter usually does, namely the change-of-use authorisation examined in the next section.
Breaching these duties is expensive, and the scale has risen. Failure to declare is punishable by an administrative fine of up to 10,000 euros imposed by the municipality; false declarations or use of a false number expose you to up to 20,000 euros; exceeding the day limit exposes you to a civil fine of up to 15,000 euros ordered by the president of the tribunal judiciaire (the ordinary civil court) on application by the municipality. Municipalities in tense housing zones take these powers seriously, and Paris, Lyon, Bordeaux, Nice and many coastal resorts run dedicated control units that cross-check platform listings against the register.
A final practical point for British owners: the declaration is made in person, online, and in French. If you are UK-resident and manage from London, nothing prevents you from filing it yourself, but keep the acknowledgement, the number and every update in a file you can produce years later. Day counts, platform statements and tax notices are the evidence that wins or loses the disputes described in Part II.
B. When does your letting need a change-of-use authorisation, and what do the courts actually punish?
Registration is only half of the system. In a large and growing list of municipalities — Paris, the inner Paris region (Île-de-France), the other big cities and many tourist resorts — turning a dwelling into short-term tourist accommodation also requires a prior change-of-use authorisation (autorisation de changement d’usage) from the mayor. The two formalities are independent, and confusing them is the single most punished mistake in this field.
The foundation is Article L. 631-7 of the Construction and Housing Code (code de la construction et de l’habitation). In the municipalities it covers, the change of use of residential premises may be subjected to prior authorisation. A unit counts as residential if it was used as housing at any date between 1 January 1970 and 31 December 1976, or at any moment during the thirty years before the authorisation request or the dispute, and any later authorised change of use resets the position. The burden of proving an unlawful use lies on the party alleging it, but in practice municipalities arrive with platform screenshots, booking calendars and bailiff reports, so the burden is rarely their problem. The authorisation itself is granted by the mayor under Article L. 631-7-1, it may be made conditional on compensation (compensation) — typically converting other space back into housing — it is granted personally to the applicant, and it ceases when the authorised activity definitively ends, unless compensation attached it to the premises. One sentence of that article deserves memorising: the use of the relevant premises is never affected by the thirty-year prescription of Article 2227 of the Civil Code, so a long-tolerated letting does not become lawful with time.
The penalty provision is Article L. 651-2 of the same Code, whose opening is categorical:
“Toute personne qui enfreint les dispositions des articles L. 631-7 ou L. 631-7-1 A ou qui ne se conforme pas aux conditions ou obligations imposées en application des mêmes articles L. 631-7 et L. 631-7-1 A est condamnée à une amende civile dont le montant ne peut excéder 100 000 € par local irrégulièrement transformé.”
The same article allows the court to order the return of the unit to residential use within a fixed period, then impose a daily penalty of up to 1,000 euros per day and per square metre, and ultimately to have the eviction and the works carried out at the offender’s expense. These are civil fines sued for by the municipality before the president of the tribunal judiciaire in fast-track proceedings, but their scale is frankly criminal.
Three decisions of the Third Civil Chamber of the Court of Cassation (Cour de cassation), the court that unifies civil case law in France, map the traps exactly. In Cass. 3rd civ., 27 June 2024, appeal no. 23-13.131, a tenant and her management company argued that the official star-rating (classement) of their flat as a tourist furnished unit authorised the activity and dispensed with the municipal change-of-use authorisation. The Court quashed that reasoning and held, in its own words:
“Selon le premier de ces textes, dans certaines communes, le changement d’usage des locaux destinés à l’habitation est soumis à autorisation préalable. Le fait de louer un local meublé destiné à l’habitation de manière répétée pour de courtes durées à une clientèle de passage qui n’y élit pas domicile constitue un changement d’usage au sens de ce texte.”
The classification decision, the Court added, is pronounced by the body that carried out the inspection visit under procedures set by the State — it is, in substance, a quality label, and it can never replace the mayor’s authorisation. If an agency tells you that a classement in stars puts you in order, that advice is worthless against a municipality.
The most recent word, only weeks old, closes the two defences owners raise most often. In Cass. 3rd civ., 3 September 2026, appeal no. 25-16.157, an owner whose request for change of use had been definitively refused argued that her seasonal letting was a purely civil activity without hotel services and that her co-ownership rules (règlement de copropriété) allowed lettings. The Court of Cassation quashed the appeal court’s acquittal “par des motifs inopérants” — on irrelevant grounds — restating first the rule:
“dans certaines communes, le changement d’usage des locaux destinés à l’habitation est soumis à autorisation préalable. Un local est réputé à usage d’habitation au sens de ce texte s’il était affecté à cet usage au 1er janvier 1970. Le fait de louer un local meublé destiné à l’habitation de manière répétée pour de courtes durées à une clientèle de passage qui n’y élit pas domicile constitue un changement d’usage.”
and then the rebuke:
“En statuant ainsi, par des motifs inopérants, alors qu’elle avait constaté que l’appartement était à usage d’habitation et qu’il avait été donné en location de manière répétée pour de courtes durées à une clientèle de passage qui n’y élit pas domicile sans autorisation préalable de changement d’usage, la cour d’appel a violé les textes susvisés.”
Neither the civil nature of the activity nor the tolerance of the co-ownership saves an unauthorised short-term letting. Earlier, in Cass. 3rd civ., 9 November 2022, appeals nos. 21-20.464 and 21-20.814, the Court had already rejected challenges against a Paris decision fining the owner company of a Paris flat 20,000 euros for repeated short lets in breach of Article L. 631-7. Paris fines routinely run into tens of thousands of euros per unit.
What does this mean concretely for a British owner in Paris or the Île-de-France? Paris and the surrounding controlled municipalities apply the full machinery. Letting your main Paris home occasionally, within the day limit and with a registration number, needs no change-of-use authorisation. Letting a second home, a pied-à-terre or an investment studio short-term needs the mayor’s prior authorisation, and in Paris that authorisation is in practice conditional on compensation, which for an individual British owner is usually difficult and costly to provide — that is why so many Paris files end in fines. Before buying or letting, ask the mairie (town hall) whether the district is subject to authorisation, what the current council decision (délibération) requires, and whether the 120-day ceiling has been lowered; if authorisation is refused, the municipality must state its reasons, and those written reasons are the starting point of any challenge. Never start letting while the application is pending unless a lawyer has confirmed that the specific council rules allow it: each night let without authorisation feeds the fine.
II. How is your French furnished rental taxed, and how do you challenge the bill?
A. Where do you pay tax on the rents, and what does the non-professional furnished regime leave you after the 2024 reform?
France taxes the rents first. Under Article 164 B-I-a of the General Tax Code (code général des impôts), income from buildings situated in France counts as French-source income, and Article 6 of the France–United Kingdom double taxation convention of 19 June 2008, whose in-force text is published by the United Kingdom government, follows the international standard: rents from immovable property are taxable in the country where the property sits. You therefore declare the rents in France in all cases; if you are also UK-resident, you declare them in the United Kingdom too and claim relief there for the French tax, so the same pound of rent is not taxed twice. The companion question — which country is your tax home when you live between London and France — is governed on the French side by Article 4 B of the General Tax Code (home, principal stay, professional activity or centre of economic interests in France) with tax treaties breaking dual-residence ties; the reverse flow, a British resident of France receiving United Kingdom rents, is examined in our guide to British landlords in France with United Kingdom rental income.
French income tax treats furnished letting as a business activity, not as passive property income. The official guidance of the French tax administration for non-residents letting a furnished unit states the principle in its own words:
“Les revenus résultant de la location de locaux meublés situés en France dont vous êtes propriétaire, ainsi que ceux provenant de la sous-location de locaux meublés situés en France dont vous êtes locataire, sont soumis à l’impôt sur le revenu dans la catégorie des bénéfices industriels et commerciaux (BIC).”
Bénéfices industriels et commerciaux (BIC) means industrial and commercial profits: you are, in tax terms, running a small lodging business, whether you see yourself as a landlord or not. The same page tells non-residents to report on the supplementary return 2042-C-PRO — gross receipts in boxes 5ND to 5PD under the micro regime, or the accounting result from return 2031 under the real regime — and to use return 2042-NR for the year of departure from or return to France. Keep the document your platform must send you each January showing the gross amount of the previous year’s transactions; the administration receives the same data directly from the platforms.
Most British owners start as loueurs en meublé non professionnels (LMNP, non-professional furnished landlords), as opposed to loueurs professionnels (LMP), a status with strict thresholds and its own social-security affiliation. Within LMNP you choose, or fall by default, between the micro regime and the real regime (régime réel). This is where the Act of 19 November 2024 hurts. Article 50-0 of the General Tax Code, in its version in force since 1 July 2026, provides that businesses whose main activity is letting tourist furnished units, other than the classified and rural categories protected elsewhere, stay in the micro regime only up to “15 000 € s’il s’agit d’entreprises dont l’activité principale est de louer directement ou indirectement des meublés de tourisme”, with “un abattement de 30 % pour le chiffre d’affaires provenant d’activités de la catégorie mentionnée au 1° bis” — a 30 per cent flat-rate allowance. The tax administration confirms that the threshold was cut from 77,700 euros to 15,000 euros for unclassified tourist furnished lets. Above 15,000 euros of annual rents, or by choice, you move to the real regime: you deduct your actual charges — agency fees, insurance, repairs, taxe foncière, interest — and, crucially, depreciation (amortissement) of the property and furniture, which the micro allowance only roughly approximates. For a British owner with a mortgaged Paris studio or a renovated Dordogne barn, the real regime very often produces a lower taxable result than the 30 per cent allowance, at the price of keeping accounts and filing return 2031. Take advice before your second letting year: the choice is sticky, and a default micro filing at 30 per cent on 40,000 euros of rents is an expensive habit.
Classified tourist furnished units (meublés classés, star-rated), rural gîtes (gîtes ruraux) and guest rooms (chambres d’hôtes) keep more generous micro bands under the same article; if your property can genuinely earn classification, the inspection visit may pay for itself in tax. Long-term furnished tenancies — a one-year furnished lease to a tenant who lives there, or the nine-month student variant — sit outside the tourist-furnished category and keep the higher 77,700-euro threshold of the general micro-BIC band. That contrast drives real planning: an owner who cannot obtain a Paris change-of-use authorisation may lawfully switch the same flat to a long-term furnished lease and escape both the authorisation and the 15,000-euro trap in one move.
On top of income tax come the social levies (prélèvements sociaux: CSG, CRDS and the solidarity levy). Non-residents affiliated to a social-security scheme in another European Economic Area state or in Switzerland have been exempted from parts of these levies since the Dreyer line of cases, but the position of United Kingdom affiliates after Brexit turns on the exact coordination rules and on whether you hold an S1 healthcare certificate or remain within a United Kingdom scheme. The tax administration maintains a dedicated page asking whether non-residents owe social charges and on which income: check it against your own affiliation before assuming either exemption or liability, because the wrong assumption compounds with interest year after year. Add the local layers: the visitor tax (taxe de séjour), collected in real time by the platform when it acts as payment intermediary, and the business property tax (cotisation foncière des entreprises, CFE), to which furnished landlords are in principle liable from the second year, with small-revenue reliefs that your local business-tax office (service des impôts des entreprises) applies.
B. How do you challenge a municipal fine or a French tax bill from London?
Start with triage, because fines and taxes travel through different courts and different clocks. A civil fine for unauthorised change of use is sued for by the municipality before the president of the tribunal judiciaire; an administrative fine for missing or false registration is imposed by the municipality itself; income tax and social charges are assessed by the tax administration and challenged before the tax courts. Sending a tax complaint to the town hall, or a change-of-use defence to the tax office, wastes the very weeks you cannot afford.
Against a change-of-use action, your defences are factual and narrow, because the Court of Cassation has closed the creative ones. Usable arguments include: the unit was not residential at the relevant date (new-build authorised for another use, with the later authorisation to prove it); the lettings were not repeated short lets to a passing clientele (a genuine medium-term furnished lease to a student or worker who lived there points the other way); the occupier used the wrong defendant (tenant sued instead of owner, or manager sued for the owner’s decision); and the amount, where the court has discretion within the 100,000-euro ceiling per unit. What no longer works after the September 2026 decision is arguing the civil nature of the activity, the absence of hotel services, or the tolerance of the co-ownership. If the facts are against you, the priority shifts to damage control: stop the offending lettings immediately, apply for authorisation or convert to long-term furnished letting, and offer the return to residential use before the court orders it under a daily penalty — every week of continued short lets after service of the summons is priced at up to 1,000 euros per day per square metre.
Against an administrative registration fine, file a written recours gracieux (informal appeal) to the mayor at once, attaching the missing declaration, the number, or the corrected information, and keep proof of posting; parallel court time limits run from the decision, so diary the appeal to the administrative court (tribunal administratif) as well and take advice before the deadline printed on the decision expires. Many day-count disputes are won on records: platform calendars, bank statements showing the actual letting income, and proof that dépassements came from genuine professional, health or force-majeure reasons the statute expressly allows.
Against a tax assessment, file a formal claim (réclamation) with the office that issued the notice — for non-residents, the non-resident tax office at Noisy-le-Grand whose address the impots.gouv.fr guidance gives — setting out each disputed head (micro versus real regime, deductible charges, depreciation, treaty credit, social levies) with the returns, platform statements, loan schedules and S1 or affiliation evidence attached. If the claim is rejected expressly or by silence, the appeal lies to the administrative court, again within the time limit stated on the rejection. Two practical habits decide most files: keep the January platform statements for every year, because undeclared platform income now arrives pre-filled in the administration’s data; and keep your residence evidence (tax notices, S1, United Kingdom self-assessment) with the same file, because the treaty relief and the social-levy position both depend on it.
Finally, manage the property as a business from day one. Declare the start of the furnished-letting activity so a SIRET business number is issued, file the correct return (2042-C-PRO with 2031 under the real regime), pay the visitor tax or verify the platform does, and check the CFE assessment when it arrives. British owners who run the letting from London through a French-speaking agent and an accountant file fewer appeals because they generate fewer assessments — and when they must appeal, their files are complete.
Conclusion
Letting a French home furnished after Brexit rests on three pillars. First, register every tourist let on the national portal before advertising, display the number everywhere, and respect the 120-day ceiling if the property is your main residence. Second, in Paris, the Île-de-France and other controlled zones, treat a second home let short-term as a change of use requiring the mayor’s prior authorisation — a star-rating, the civil nature of the activity and the indulgence of your co-owners are all, in the Court of Cassation’s word, irrelevant. Third, declare the rents in France as BIC profits, choose consciously between the 15,000-euro micro band at 30 per cent and the real regime with depreciation, claim your treaty relief in the United Kingdom, and verify your social-levy position against your actual affiliation. Fines and assessments are challengeable, but only within their own procedures and clocks, and only with records. Get the registration, the authorisation and the tax regime right before the first guest, and the French furnished let remains what it should be: a well-run small business that pays for your French home rather than a file that funds the municipality.