{"id":2136618,"date":"2026-10-02T16:42:18","date_gmt":"2026-10-02T14:42:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/kohenavocats.fr\/2026\/10\/02\/france-loi-carrez-shortfall-price-cut-foreign-buyers-one-year-claim\/"},"modified":"2026-10-02T16:42:18","modified_gmt":"2026-10-02T14:42:18","slug":"france-loi-carrez-shortfall-price-cut-foreign-buyers-one-year-claim","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/kohenavocats.fr\/en\/2026\/10\/02\/france-loi-carrez-shortfall-price-cut-foreign-buyers-one-year-claim\/","title":{"rendered":"Your Paris Flat Is Smaller Than the Deed Says: the Loi Carrez Price-Cut Claim Foreign Buyers Must File Within One Year"},"content":{"rendered":"

You signed for 62 square metres in the 17th arrondissement, and your architect has just measured 57. In Paris, where a single square metre can be worth more than a family car, that gap is not a rounding error: it is a legal claim. French law gives the buyer of a co-ownership lot a strict, almost mechanical remedy when the private area stated in the deed was overstated. It is called the loi Carrez<\/em> action (statutory private-area guarantee), and it can return tens of thousands of euros to a foreign buyer \u2014 provided it is brought within one year of the final deed of sale.<\/p>\n

This guide explains, for non-resident owners and buyers, how the guarantee works, how the 5% trigger is computed, which rooms count and which do not, and how to protect the one-year deadline from abroad. It is written for buyers of existing flats (vente dans l’ancien<\/em>, sale of an existing property); off-plan sales (vente en l’\u00e9tat futur d’ach\u00e8vement<\/a><\/em>, sale before completion) follow a different surface regime, and the difference matters.<\/p>\n

I. The Carrez guarantee: a strict refund when the stated area was overstated<\/h2>\n

Article 46 of the French Act of 10 July 1965 on co-ownership (loi du 10 juillet 1965 fixant le statut de la copropri\u00e9t\u00e9<\/a><\/em>, statute governing co-owned buildings) requires every agreement promising the sale of a co-ownership lot, and every final deed transferring it, to state the private area of the lot (superficie de la partie privative<\/em>, private floor area of the unit). Where the actual area turns out to be more than one-twentieth smaller than the area stated, the buyer may sue for a proportional reduction of the price. The seller cannot defeat the claim by arguing good faith, by blaming the estate agent’s flyer, or by pointing out that the buyer visited the flat: the measurement either matches the deed, or it does not.<\/p>\n

Three features make this remedy unusually attractive for foreign buyers. First, it is not a fault-based claim: no fraud, concealment or negligence needs to be proved. Second, the reduction is arithmetic: missing square metres multiplied by the price per square metre stated or implied. Third, at Paris prices, even a modest shortfall produces a large refund. A 4 sqm shortfall on a flat bought for 780,000 euros with 64 sqm stated represents a refund of about 48,750 euros. That arithmetic explains why a fresh measurement by an independent surveyor is one of the highest-value checks a new owner can commission in the months following completion.<\/p>\n

A. What counts, what is excluded, and how the 5% trigger works<\/h3>\n

The superficie privative<\/em> (private area within the meaning of the Carrez statute) is not the number on the estate agent’s brochure, nor the living space shown on an energy report. It is the floor area of the enclosed private rooms of the lot, measured inside the walls, after deducting the area occupied by walls, partitions, staircases, pipe ducts and door and window recesses, and after excluding any part of a room with a ceiling height below 1.80 metres. Balconies, terraces, loggias, cellars, garages, parking spaces, storage rooms outside the flat and common areas are all excluded from the count, even when they belong to the same lot. A mansarded bedroom under the eaves of a Haussmann building therefore counts only for the portion where the ceiling reaches 1.80 metres; a 12 sqm attic room with half its floor under a sloping ceiling may contribute only 7 sqm to the Carrez area.<\/p>\n

The trigger is a shortfall of more than one-twentieth: the actual area must be at least 5% smaller than the stated area. A stated 60 sqm with an actual 57.5 sqm gives a shortfall of 2.5 sqm, or 4.17%: no claim. A stated 60 sqm with an actual 56.5 sqm gives a shortfall of 3.5 sqm, or 5.83%: the claim is open, and the refund covers the whole 3.5 sqm, not merely the fraction above the threshold. The reduction is proportional: contract price multiplied by the ratio of missing area to stated area. Buyers should therefore keep both numbers from the final deed \u2014 the total price and the stated area \u2014 because the price per square metre used by the court comes from that deed, not from a later market estimate.<\/p>\n

What the rooms are actually used for at the time of the sale decides whether they count, not the label written in the co-ownership rules (r\u00e8glement de copropri\u00e9t\u00e9<\/em>, the building’s binding co-ownership by-laws) or in the deed. In a widely followed ruling, the Third Civil Chamber of the Cour de cassation<\/em> (France’s highest civil court) approved judges who had included a basement room in the Carrez area although the deed and the by-laws still called it a cellar: the room was connected by an internal staircase to the ground-floor shop, had been fitted out and was used as a stockroom, so it was no longer a cellar in fact. The Court held exactly that “il y avait lieu de prendre en compte le bien tel qu’il se pr\u00e9sentait mat\u00e9riellement au moment de la vente”<\/a>, which means that the property must be assessed as it physically stood on the day of the sale. The practical lesson runs in both directions: a seller cannot hide behind an outdated label to exclude a fitted-out room, and a buyer cannot complain that a genuine cellar or parking space was left out of the measurement, since the statute excludes them by nature. For Paris buyers, the most common disputes concern maid’s rooms (chambres de service<\/em>, small former staff rooms on the top floor) with low ceiling portions, entrance halls invaded by pipework enclosures, and mezzanines whose height falls short of 1.80 metres.<\/p>\n

General sale law confirms the same one-twentieth logic outside co-ownership. “Dans tous les autres cas, Soit que la vente soit faite d’un corps certain et limit\u00e9, Soit qu’elle ait pour objet des fonds distincts et s\u00e9par\u00e9s, Soit qu’elle commence par la mesure, ou par la d\u00e9signation de l’objet vendu suivie de la mesure, L’expression de cette mesure ne donne lieu \u00e0 aucun suppl\u00e9ment de prix, en faveur du vendeur, pour l’exc\u00e9dent de mesure, ni en faveur de l’acqu\u00e9reur, \u00e0 aucune diminution du prix pour moindre mesure, qu’autant que la diff\u00e9rence de la mesure r\u00e9elle \u00e0 celle exprim\u00e9e au contrat est d’un vingti\u00e8me en plus ou en moins, eu \u00e9gard \u00e0 la valeur de la totalit\u00e9 des objets vendus, s’il n’y a stipulation contraire.”<\/a> In plain English, this means that where a sale states a measurement, neither party owes anything for the difference unless the gap reaches one-twentieth of the value of the whole property sold, absent a contrary clause. And “Si la vente d’un immeuble a \u00e9t\u00e9 faite avec indication de la contenance, \u00e0 raison de tant la mesure, le vendeur est oblig\u00e9 de d\u00e9livrer \u00e0 l’acqu\u00e9reur, s’il l’exige, la quantit\u00e9 indiqu\u00e9e au contrat ; Et si la chose ne lui est pas possible, ou si l’acqu\u00e9reur ne l’exige pas, le vendeur est oblig\u00e9 de souffrir une diminution proportionnelle du prix.”<\/a> In plain English, this means that where a property is sold by reference to a stated size at a price per unit, the seller must either deliver the stated quantity or accept a proportional price cut. These general provisions help to read the Carrez regime, but for a co-ownership lot it is Article 46 of the 1965 Act, with its one-year deadline, that governs and that the buyer should invoke first.<\/p>\n

B. The deed mention that decides everything: a compromis without an area can be annulled<\/h3>\n

The area must appear twice: in the preliminary contract (compromis de vente<\/a><\/em>, preliminary sale agreement, or promesse de vente<\/em>, unilateral or bilateral promise to sell) and in the final notarised deed (acte authentique<\/em>, deed executed before a notary). The sanction differs at each stage, and foreign buyers should understand both. If the preliminary contract omits the private area entirely, the buyer may sue for nullity of that preliminary contract. If the final deed states the area, the buyer loses the price-reduction claim only through the one-year action described below; the nullity weapon belongs to the pre-completion phase.<\/p>\n

The leading decision is a 22 November 2018 ruling of the Third Civil Chamber (appeal no. 17-23.366), which annulled a Paris appeal judgment that had tried to save an area-less preliminary contract through a separately signed measurement certificate. The Cour de cassation<\/em> held that “lorsque la promesse de vente ne comporte pas la mention de la superficie de la partie privative des lots vendus, seule la signature de l’acte authentique constatant la r\u00e9alisation de la vente mentionnant la superficie de la partie privative du lot ou de la fraction de lot entra\u00eene la d\u00e9ch\u00e9ance du droit \u00e0 engager ou \u00e0 poursuivre une action en nullit\u00e9 de la promesse ou du contrat qui l’a pr\u00e9c\u00e9d\u00e9e, fond\u00e9e sur l’absence de mention de cette superficie”<\/a>, which means that when the preliminary contract omits the private area, only signing the final notarised deed that does state the area extinguishes the right to bring or continue a nullity action based on that omission. In that case, two flats and a cellar had been promised by private deed on 5 December 2013 with completion fixed for 2 April 2014 at the latest, and the buyers had merely countersigned a surveyor’s certificate marked as acknowledged; the Court ruled that this side document could not cure the defect. For a foreign buyer, the message is concrete: check the compromis<\/em> before signing, not after. If the area line is blank or marked as approximate without a proper measurement annex, raise the point with the notary (notaire<\/em>, public officer who authenticates the conveyance) immediately, because once the final deed with the area is signed, the nullity action is lost and only the one-year price-reduction action remains.<\/p>\n

Symmetrically, buyers should not confuse the Carrez area with the living-space figures used in other documents. The energy performance report (diagnostic de performance \u00e9nerg\u00e9tique<\/em>, energy efficiency assessment), the housing-tax records and the agent’s floor plan each use their own conventions, and none of them replaces the Carrez measurement annexed to the deed. Where the deed’s own surveyor made the error, that surveyor’s professional liability may later be engaged, but the primary claim remains against the seller under Article 46: the buyer does not need to prove who measured badly, only that the deed’s figure was overstated by more than one-twentieth. Readers who want background on the conveyancing chain in which this guarantee sits can consult our overview of French real estate transactions and litigation for international clients in Paris<\/a>, which places the preliminary contract, the notary’s checks and post-completion disputes in their procedural order.<\/p>\n

II. Winning the claim from abroad: deadlines, proof, and parallel weapons<\/h2>\n

The Carrez action is powerful but perishable. It must be brought within one year of the final notarised deed, and that time limit is a forfeiture period (d\u00e9lai de forclusion<\/em>, strict time limit extinguishing the right itself), not an ordinary limitation period that the parties could suspend by agreement. A buyer living in London, New York or Tel Aviv who discovers the shortfall in month eleven must therefore be able to instruct counsel and file within weeks. The good news is that French procedure offers several safety valves \u2014 filing before the wrong court still protects the claim, and the courts apply the deadline with predictable starting points \u2014 but each valve has conditions that must be understood in advance.<\/p>\n

A. The one-year forclusion: starting point, safety valves, and who may sue<\/h3>\n

The starting point is the date of the final notarised deed of sale, not the preliminary contract, not the handover of the keys, and not the day the buyer discovers the error. “L’action en suppl\u00e9ment de prix de la part du vendeur, et celle en diminution de prix ou en r\u00e9siliation du contrat de la part de l’acqu\u00e9reur, doivent \u00eatre intent\u00e9es dans l’ann\u00e9e, \u00e0 compter du jour du contrat, \u00e0 peine de d\u00e9ch\u00e9ance.”<\/a> In plain English, this means that both the seller’s claim for extra price and the buyer’s claim for a price reduction or termination must be filed within one year starting from the day of the contract, on pain of forfeiture. For the Carrez action, the contract that counts is the acte authentique<\/em> of sale. A buyer who signed the final deed on 15 March 2026 must therefore file by 15 March 2027. A demand letter (mise en demeure<\/em>, formal demand to comply) or settlement talks do not interrupt a forfeiture period; only a court filing (assignation<\/em>, writ of summons) or another statutory interrupting act does. Diary management is everything: the buyer should calendar the deadline on the day of completion and commission any counter-measurement no later than month eight, leaving time for a bailiff’s report and drafting if the survey confirms a shortfall.<\/p>\n

The first safety valve concerns filing before the wrong court. In a landmark joint-chambers ruling of 24 November 2006 (appeal no. 04-18.610), buyers who had acquired a co-ownership lot on 17 December 1999 with an actual area more than 5% below the stated figure sued on 12 December 2000 before the district court, which declared itself without jurisdiction over the amount claimed and referred the case to the regional court on 23 March 2001 \u2014 after the one-year period had expired. The seller argued the claim was dead. The Cour de cassation<\/em>, sitting in mixed chamber, disagreed, holding that “la citation en justice donn\u00e9e m\u00eame devant un juge incomp\u00e9tent interrompt la prescription”<\/a>, which means that a writ served even before a court lacking jurisdiction interrupts the time limit. The Court added that this general rule applies to all deadlines for bringing proceedings and to every kind of lack of jurisdiction, and that since the first court had been seised within the Article 46 period, the action was admissible. For a foreign claimant, the lesson is practical rather than an invitation to file anywhere: if there is genuine doubt about which division of the Paris judicial court has jurisdiction over the amount, filing promptly before the plausibly competent court preserves the right while the referral sorts itself out. Deliberately filing before a manifestly incompetent court to gain time is not a strategy any serious lawyer will recommend, but an honest jurisdictional mistake does not kill the claim.<\/p>\n

The second point concerns who holds the claim. The price-reduction action belongs to the buyer who owned the lot when the deadline expired, and a company that had not yet acquired buyer status when the year ran out cannot regularise afterwards. In a 7 April 2016 decision (appeal no. 15-10.881), a property company that had bought co-ownership lots on 10 June 2002 through founders acting for a company in formation sued for a reduction on 4 June 2003, invoking an area more than one-twentieth below the deed figure; the lower courts debated whether the company had proved, in the required form, the date of the shareholders’ resolution taking over the pre-incorporation acts before the forfeiture period expired. The file records that “qu’un jugement du 13 janvier 2009 a d\u00e9clar\u00e9 cette demande irrecevable au motif que la SARL ne d\u00e9montrait pas qu’elle avait acquis la qualit\u00e9 d’acqu\u00e9reur avant l’extinction du d\u00e9lai de d\u00e9ch\u00e9ance pr\u00e9vu par l’article 46 de la loi du 10 juillet 1965”<\/a>, which means that a 2009 judgment had thrown out the claim because the company could not show it had become the buyer before the Article 46 forfeiture period ran out. Foreign buyers using a French property company (soci\u00e9t\u00e9 civile immobili\u00e8re<\/em>, non-trading property-holding company, commonly called SCI) or buying through a company in formation should take this warning literally: complete the corporate takeover paperwork immediately after incorporation, keep dated proof, and file the Carrez claim in the name of the entity that actually owns the lot on the filing date. Where the flat was bought jointly by spouses or partners, all buyers should join the claim together.<\/p>\n

Off-plan buyers need a different reflex. For sales before completion, the deed figure is not a Carrez area but a habitable area (surface habitable<\/em>, dwelling floor space as defined for new homes), and the comparison follows construction-law rules rather than Article 46. On 18 March 2021 (appeal no. 19-24.994), the Third Civil Chamber quashed a Paris judgment that had refused any comparison with habitable area in an off-plan dispute, ruling that “que, dans l’acte de vente vis\u00e9 \u00e0 l’article L. 261-10 du code de la construction et de l’habitation, la surface stipul\u00e9e s’entend d’une surface habitable au sens de l’article R. 111-2 du m\u00eame code, excluant les locaux d’une hauteur inf\u00e9rieure \u00e0 1,80 m\u00e8tre”<\/a>, which means that in the sale contract governed by the construction code, the stated area means habitable area, excluding rooms lower than 1.80 metres. A foreign buyer of a new-build flat in the Paris region who finds the delivered flat smaller must therefore plead the construction-code provisions on the sale description and the general law of sale rather than the Carrez forfeiture action \u2014 with different deadlines, including the general one-year period of Article 1622 of the Civil Code for measurement disputes running from the contract. Mixing up the two regimes is the most frequent pleading error in new-build files, and it is also the easiest to avoid once the distinction is known.<\/p>\n

B. Measuring, suing, and settling from abroad, with Paris practice in mind<\/h3>\n

A winning file is built in four steps, each of which can be handled from abroad with the right local contacts. First, commission an independent counter-measurement. Instruct a surveyor (g\u00e9om\u00e8tre-expert<\/em>, licensed surveyor) or a qualified diagnostic technician who has no link with the seller, the agent or the original surveyor, and ask for a room-by-room Carrez measurement with a sketch showing ceiling heights below 1.80 metres, deducted wall thicknesses and excluded areas. Insist on receiving the surveyor’s methodology note: courts compare methodologies, and a report that simply announces a total without showing deductions carries less weight than one that walks the judge through each room. Keep the invoice and the surveyor’s insurance details, because if the original measurement was negligently wrong, the surveyor who made it may later contribute to the compensation.<\/p>\n

Second, secure evidence of the current state before any works. Photograph every room, keep the deed’s measurement annex, the co-ownership by-laws, the sale advertisement and the preliminary contract. If works are planned \u2014 and Paris buyers often renovate immediately \u2014 have a bailiff (commissaire de justice<\/em>, court officer empowered to draw up official factual reports) record the layout and heights before demolition, or at minimum keep dated photographs with a measuring tape visible. The material-state rule cuts both ways: the seller will argue that post-sale alterations explain the gap, so a buyer who knocked down a partition or raised a floor before measuring invites that defence. Measure first, renovate second.<\/p>\n

Third, send a quantified formal demand to the seller, then file promptly before the Paris judicial court (tribunal judiciaire de Paris<\/em>, the court with jurisdiction over Paris property disputes) if no settlement follows. The demand should state the deed figure, the counter-measured figure, the percentage shortfall, the arithmetic of the reduction claimed, and a deadline to pay, and it should be sent by registered letter with acknowledgment of receipt or by bailiff’s service. Settlement is common: sellers and their insurers know the case law, and a well-documented file with a 7% shortfall often settles at or near the arithmetic figure, because neither side wants to pay for a court-appointed expert (expertise judiciaire<\/em>, independent technical assessment ordered by the court) that will most likely confirm the surveyor. From abroad, the whole sequence can be delegated under a written authority (pouvoir<\/em>, power of attorney) to a Paris lawyer, who can also arrange service, translation of foreign documents and remote signing of procedural documents; the buyer is generally not required to attend hearings in person for this type of claim.<\/p>\n

Fourth, keep parallel weapons in reserve without confusing them. If the one-year Carrez period has already expired when the shortfall is discovered, two fallback routes exist, each harder than the Carrez claim. Hidden defects (vices cach\u00e9s<\/a><\/em>, concealed defects rendering the property unfit for its use) allow the buyer to seek cancellation or a price reduction: “Le vendeur est tenu de la garantie \u00e0 raison des d\u00e9fauts cach\u00e9s de la chose vendue qui la rendent impropre \u00e0 l’usage auquel on la destine, ou qui diminuent tellement cet usage que l’acheteur ne l’aurait pas acquise, ou n’en aurait donn\u00e9 qu’un moindre prix, s’il les avait connus.”<\/a> In plain English, this means that the seller guarantees the buyer against hidden defects that make the property unfit for its intended use, or so impair that use that the buyer would not have bought, or would have paid less, had the defect been known. But a mere area shortfall is not automatically a hidden defect, and the action must be brought within two years of discovering the defect: “L’action r\u00e9sultant des vices r\u00e9dhibitoires doit \u00eatre intent\u00e9e par l’acqu\u00e9reur dans un d\u00e9lai de deux ans \u00e0 compter de la d\u00e9couverte du vice.”<\/a> In plain English, this means that the buyer’s defect-based claim must be filed within two years of discovering the defect. Fraud (dol<\/em>, deliberate misrepresentation inducing consent) or fundamental mistake (erreur<\/em>, mistaken belief going to the substance of the bargain) may be arguable where the seller knowingly inflated the area, but they require proof of intent or of a decisive mistake, which the Carrez action spares the buyer. The hierarchy is therefore simple: file the Carrez claim within the year whenever possible, and plead the defect or fraud routes only as alternatives, with their own evidence and deadlines.<\/p>\n

Paris and \u00cele-de-France practice adds three local points worth knowing. Jurisdiction and procedure run through the Paris judicial court for flats in the capital, with its specialised property divisions accustomed to measurement disputes; claims above the lowest jurisdictional threshold go to the full court with compulsory legal representation, which is another reason to instruct a Paris procedure lawyer early rather than corresponding directly with the seller. Price levels make expert battles worthwhile: at 10,000 to 14,000 euros per square metre in much of intra-muros Paris, a contested 2 sqm is worth 20,000 to 28,000 euros, comfortably above the cost of a surveyor and a first-instance action, while in the outer suburbs the same 2 sqm may barely cover costs \u2014 a realistic costs-benefits assessment should precede any filing. Finally, the building stock shapes disputes: Haussmann and faubourg flats bring mansarded top floors, decorative ceiling coffers that do not affect floor area but confuse amateur measurers, and former service staircases whose status must be checked against the lot description; post-war and new-build stock brings loggias and winter gardens wrongly included by optimistic agents. A buyer-side surveyor familiar with Parisian typologies pays for himself by classifying each of these correctly the first time.<\/p>\n

A short tax flag, without detailed tax advice: a price reduction changes the economics of the purchase and may have knock-on effects on registration-duty adjustments, wealth-tax valuation and capital-gains computation on a later resale. These effects depend on residence, treaty position and holding structure, so the refund cheque should be shown promptly to the buyer’s tax adviser rather than spent in advance. The same applies to co-owners holding through an SCI: the refund belongs to the company, and distributing it has its own treatment. Our Paris real estate team advising international owners<\/a> routinely coordinates the civil claim with the buyer’s existing tax counsel so that the victory on the area does not create an avoidable problem elsewhere.<\/p>\n

Conclusion<\/h2>\n

A flat that is smaller than its deed can still be the right purchase \u2014 at the right price. The loi Carrez<\/em> mechanism exists precisely to restore that price: a strict, arithmetic refund for any shortfall beyond one-twentieth, secured by a nullity sanction when the preliminary contract omits the area, and protected by case law that forgives an honest filing before the wrong court but never forgives missing the one-year forfeiture deadline. The decisive steps are all within a foreign owner’s reach: read the area line of the compromis<\/em> before signing, commission an independent Carrez survey in the months after completion, photograph before renovating, and file within one year of the final deed in the name of the true owner. Measured early and claimed in time, the missing square metres come back as money; discovered late, they remain what the deed wrongly said they were.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Your Paris flat measures less than the deed states. 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