You live in Britain, you own a holiday home in the Dordogne, in Brittany or on the C\u00f4te d’Azur, and you have decided to sell. Since Brexit, that sale follows a set of rules that many British owners discover only at the signing table: France taxes the gain first, Britain taxes it second with a credit for the French bill, a 19 per cent French levy applies to the gain, social charges of either 17.2 per cent or 7.5 per cent come on top depending on where you pay social security, and \u2014 this is the point that now catches out almost every British seller \u2014 you must appoint an accredited fiscal representative established in France before the deed can even be registered. This article explains, in order, how France calculates the gain on a French second home sold by a person who lives in the United Kingdom, how the social charges work for someone affiliated to the British system, what the conveyancing chain looks like from across the Channel, and how to challenge the bill when the figures are wrong. Every French legal term is explained as it appears, and every decisive proposition is tied to the statute, the case law or the official guidance that states it.<\/p>\n
French tax law treats you as a non-resident seller. Article 164 B of the French General Tax Code (Code g\u00e9n\u00e9ral des imp\u00f4ts<\/em>, the CGI) lists as French-source income the capital gains defined in Articles 150 U, 150 UB and 150 UC where they relate to buildings situated in France or rights over such buildings, and Article 164 B<\/a> is the hook on which the whole non-resident regime hangs. Article 244 bis A then provides that, subject to international tax treaties, gains as defined in Article 164 B realised by the persons listed in the Article on the sale of the property listed in it are subject to a levy (pr\u00e9l\u00e8vement<\/em>, a withholding-style tax collected at the sale) at the rates set in section III bis, and the persons caught expressly include individuals who are not domiciled in France for tax purposes: Article 244 bis A<\/a>. A British resident selling a French holiday home is therefore inside the levy by definition.<\/p>\n The gain itself is computed exactly as it would be for a French resident. The sale price is reduced by the purchase price, with notary fees and agency commission added to the purchase price and certain deduction items subtracted from the sale price, and the resulting gross gain is then reduced by a holding-period allowance (abattement pour dur\u00e9e de d\u00e9tention<\/em>, a percentage knocked off for each year of ownership beyond the fifth). The official tax commentary puts the income-tax allowance at 6 per cent for each year of ownership beyond the fifth up to the twenty-first year, plus 4 per cent for the twenty-second year, with full income-tax exemption once ownership exceeds twenty-two years (BOI-RFPI-PVI-20-20<\/a>). In plain terms, after about six years of ownership the allowance starts to bite, and after twenty-two years the income-tax part of the gain disappears entirely. For social charges the timetable is longer \u2014 1.65 per cent per year beyond the fifth up to the twenty-first, 1.60 per cent for the twenty-second year and 9 per cent per year beyond \u2014 with full exemption only after thirty years (BOI-RFPI-PVI-20-20<\/a>). The starting point of the holding period is normally the date of the purchase deed, and the end point is the date of the sale, so keeping the original acte authentique<\/em> (the formal notarised deed, the only fully probative record of a French property transfer) matters enormously.<\/p>\n Once the net taxable gain is fixed, the rate for an individual is 19 per cent, whatever country the seller lives in. The statute says: “Toutefois, les personnes physiques, les associ\u00e9s personnes physiques de soci\u00e9t\u00e9s, groupements ou organismes dont les b\u00e9n\u00e9fices sont impos\u00e9s au nom des associ\u00e9s et les porteurs de parts, personnes physiques, de fonds de placement immobilier mentionn\u00e9s \u00e0 l’article 239 nonies sont soumis au pr\u00e9l\u00e8vement au taux de 19 %” (Article 244 bis A, III bis<\/a>). That single 19 per cent rate for individuals is itself the product of litigation: the Conseil d’\u00c9tat, France’s supreme administrative court, has held that where a non-resident challenges a French tax on French-source income by reference to the free movement of capital, “il convient de comparer la charge fiscale support\u00e9e respectivement par ce contribuable et un contribuable r\u00e9sident de France plac\u00e9 dans une situation comparable” (CE, 9th chamber, 23 June 2022, No 445785<\/a>), and the administration now grants relief down to the 19 per cent resident rate where a higher rate was applied. Since Brexit changed nothing about that rate, the headline French income-tax cost of the sale is predictable: 19 per cent of the net gain after allowances.<\/p>\n Two surcharges can sit on top. First, gains above 50,000 euros attract the tax on high property gains (taxe sur les plus-values immobili\u00e8res \u00e9lev\u00e9es<\/em>), which applies expressly to taxpayers domiciled outside France who pay French income tax and fall under the Article 244 bis A levy (BOI-RFPI-TPVIE-10<\/a>), at rates running from 2 to 6 per cent of the gain. Second, the social charges discussed in the next section apply to the same base. A British seller should therefore think in terms of a stack \u2014 19 per cent, plus the high-gains surcharge where the gain exceeds 50,000 euros, plus social charges \u2014 rather than a single rate.<\/p>\n International law confirms that France is entitled to tax first. Article 14(1) of the France\u2013United Kingdom double tax convention of 19 June 2008, published in English on the British government’s treaty pages, provides in substance that the Contracting State where immovable property is situated may tax gains from its disposal (Article 14(1)) (2008 UK\u2013France Double Taxation Convention<\/a>). Britain then eliminates the resulting double taxation by credit: the convention’s elimination article gives the United Kingdom a credit against British tax for the French tax paid on the same gains, and HM Revenue and Customs explains how to claim that Foreign Tax Credit Relief on the Self Assessment foreign pages (GOV.UK, Tax on foreign income: if you are taxed twice<\/a>). France first, Britain second with a credit \u2014 that ordering shapes everything that follows, because any euro overpaid in France shrinks the British credit base and any euro wrongly assessed in France must be fought in France.<\/p>\n One Brexit-specific disappointment must be faced directly. French law offers two valuable exemptions to sellers who used to live in France, and neither helps the owner who simply kept a holiday home. The former-main-home exemption in Article 244 bis A applies only where the seller moved to an EU or EEA State or a State with equivalent mutual recovery assistance, under tight time conditions, and the 150,000-euro exemption of Article 150 U, II, 2\u00b0 for dwellings sold by non-residents is reserved by the official commentary to sellers who are nationals of an EU or EEA State that has signed an administrative assistance convention with France, capped at one home per taxpayer and 150,000 euros of net taxable gain, and conditional on the seller having been continuously domiciled in France for tax purposes for at least two years at some point before the sale (BOI-RFPI-PVI-10-40-50<\/a>). A British passport holder selling a house that was always a second home cannot use either route. Readers who did live in France before returning to Britain face a different, more negotiable position, described in our companion piece on leavers selling a former French home<\/a>; this article stays with the pure second-home case.<\/p>\n Social charges (pr\u00e9l\u00e8vements sociaux<\/em>, the family of levies that funds or accompanies French social protection) are where British sellers most often overpay. The default headline is 17.2 per cent of the net gain, made up of the generalised social contribution (CSG), the contribution for the repayment of the social debt (CRDS) and the solidarity levy. But European coordination law has always said that a person may only be subjected to the social legislation of one State at a time. The Montpellier administrative court of appeal put the principle this way: “Les personnes auxquelles le pr\u00e9sent r\u00e8glement est applicable ne sont soumises qu’\u00e0 la l\u00e9gislation d’un seul Etat membre. Cette l\u00e9gislation est d\u00e9termin\u00e9e conform\u00e9ment au pr\u00e9sent titre”, adding that a Union national covered by one Member State’s scheme is exempt from another Member State’s capital-income levies that operate as social-security contributions, “en raison du principe de l’unicit\u00e9 de la l\u00e9gislation applicable en mati\u00e8re de s\u00e9curit\u00e9 sociale”, and recalling “son arr\u00eat du 26 f\u00e9vrier 2015, ministre de l’\u00e9conomie et des finances contre G\u00e9rard de Ruyter (C-623\/13)” on the CSG, the CRDS and the social levy (CAA Marseille, 4th chamber, 17 March 2020, No 19MA00148<\/a>).<\/p>\n Brexit did not destroy that protection; it relocated it into the withdrawal and trade agreements. The French tax administration confirms that capital gains realised by taxpayers affiliated to the British social security system have been exempt from CSG and CRDS since 1 January 2021 where three conditions are met \u2014 affiliation to the British social security system, nationality or lawful residence of France, the United Kingdom or another EU State, and no coverage by a French compulsory social security scheme \u2014 and it confirms that such gains remain liable only to the 7.5 per cent solidarity levy (BOI-RFPI-PVINR-20-20<\/a>). The solidarity levy itself is a general-budget tax codified at Article 235 ter of the CGI<\/a>, and the social-charge base for property gains sits in Article L. 136-7 of the Social Security Code<\/a>. For the British retiree in Kent who pays National Insurance in the United Kingdom and nothing into the French compulsory scheme, the practical arithmetic is therefore 19 per cent plus 7.5 per cent \u2014 not 19 per cent plus 17.2 per cent \u2014 a difference of nearly ten points of the gain.<\/p>\n Three warnings surround that favourable arithmetic. First, the exemption must be proved at the sale: the notaire<\/em> (the French public officer who alone can authenticate a property transfer and who collects the tax at registration) will want documentary evidence of British affiliation \u2014 typically an A1 certificate, an S1 healthcare certificate where relevant, or a recent HMRC or Department for Work and Pensions letter \u2014 and where the file is silent the full 17.2 per cent is collected by default. Second, the exemption fails where the seller is in fact covered by a French compulsory scheme, for example a British owner who also works in France and contributes to the French system; dual affiliation disputes are decided on the facts of the contribution position, not on nationality. Third, the allowance timetable for social charges runs to thirty years rather than twenty-two, so a property held for, say, twenty-five years is free of the 19 per cent levy but still bears the solidarity levy on a partly relieved base. Each of these points is a frequent source of reclaims, and each reclaim starts from the same documents: the deed, the affiliation proof and the computation sheet.<\/p>\n A French property sale moves through two deeds. The compromis de vente<\/em> (the preliminary contract, broadly the equivalent of exchange of contracts) fixes the price and the timetable, and the acte authentique de vente<\/em> (the final notarised deed signed before the notaire<\/em>) transfers ownership and is published at the land registry. For a non-resident seller the notaire<\/em> does far more than authenticate: the notaire draws up the capital-gains declaration on official form 2048-IMM, computes the levy and the social charges, withholds them from the price and pays them to the Treasury when the deed is registered, as the tax administration’s individual-taxpayer pages and the form’s own notice explain (Form 2048-IMM, impots.gouv.fr<\/a>; Service-public.fr, capital gains on property<\/a>). The seller receives the net price; the tax has already left the room.<\/p>\n Before the deed can be registered, a British-domiciled seller must appoint a fiscal representative (repr\u00e9sentant fiscal accr\u00e9dit\u00e9<\/em>, a professional established in France and approved by the tax administration who signs the declaration and answers for the tax). The rule is blunt: the levy “est acquitt\u00e9 lors de l’enregistrement de l’acte ou, \u00e0 d\u00e9faut d’enregistrement, dans le mois suivant la cession, sous la responsabilit\u00e9 d’un repr\u00e9sentant \u00e9tabli en France, accr\u00e9dit\u00e9 par l’administration fiscale”, and the statute continues: “L’obligation de d\u00e9signer un repr\u00e9sentant fiscal ne s’applique pas lorsque le c\u00e9dant est domicili\u00e9, \u00e9tabli ou constitu\u00e9 dans un Etat membre de l’Union europ\u00e9enne ou dans un autre Etat partie \u00e0 l’accord sur l’Espace \u00e9conomique europ\u00e9en” (Article 244 bis A, IV and IV bis<\/a>). The statute requires the tax to be paid when the deed is registered, or within a month of the sale absent registration, under the responsibility of an accredited representative: “est acquitt\u00e9 lors de l’enregistrement de l’acte ou, \u00e0 d\u00e9faut d’enregistrement, dans le mois suivant la cession, sous la responsabilit\u00e9 d’un repr\u00e9sentant \u00e9tabli en France, accr\u00e9dit\u00e9 par l’administration fiscale” (Article 244 bis A, IV<\/a>). The administration confirms that sellers established in the EU or EEA are dispensed from this obligation (BOI-RFPI-PVINR-30-20<\/a>). Since Brexit the United Kingdom is outside both areas, so the dispensation does not cover British residents: no accredited representative, no registration, no sale. Limited exemptions exist for low-value disposals handled through approved channels, but a prudent seller treats the representative as mandatory, checks the representative’s accreditation and fee in writing before the compromis<\/em>, and understands that the representative is personally on the hook for the declared tax \u2014 which is precisely why representatives insist on complete files.<\/p>\n That personal exposure is not theoretical. In a February 2026 decision the Conseil d’\u00c9tat discharged an accredited representative whom the administration had pursued for additional levy on the ground that the declared sale price was below market value, holding: “Pour l’application de ces dispositions, le prix de cession des biens immobiliers ou des droits portant sur ces biens est le prix r\u00e9ellement convenu entre les parties”, and that the administration could not lawfully substitute market value for the deed price where it did not show “que le prix de cession stipul\u00e9 \u00e9tait inf\u00e9rieur au prix r\u00e9ellement convenu entre les parties \u00e0 la vente”, granting the representative “la d\u00e9charge du compl\u00e9ment de pr\u00e9l\u00e8vement” and the related penalties (CE, 9th and 10th chambers combined, 24 February 2026, No 496482<\/a>). The lesson for a British seller is twofold: keep evidence that the price in the deed is the genuine agreed price, and choose a representative who will defend the file rather than simply pay whatever is asked.<\/p>\n On the British side, the gain must then be reported to HM Revenue and Customs. A United Kingdom resident is taxed on worldwide gains, so the French gain goes on the Self Assessment foreign pages in the year of disposal, the French levy and the French solidarity levy are claimed as Foreign Tax Credit Relief against the British capital gains tax on the same gain, and the relief cannot exceed the British tax attributable to that gain \u2014 the mechanics are set out in HMRC’s helpsheet for foreign tax paid (HMRC Helpsheet HS263, Relief for Foreign Tax Paid<\/a>). Exchange rates matter: the gain, the French tax and the credit are all translated at the appropriate HMRC rates, and mismatched dates can silently destroy relief. Keep the French computation sheet, the deed, the proof of payment and the affiliation evidence together for six years; they are the file on which both the French challenge and the British credit depend.<\/p>\n Challenges in France begin with a formal complaint (r\u00e9clamation<\/em>, the written claim sent to the tax office that collected the levy) and continue, if the administration maintains the charge, before the administrative tribunal (tribunal administratif<\/em>, the first-level administrative court), then the administrative court of appeal (cour administrative d’appel<\/em>) and finally the Conseil d’\u00c9tat on points of law. Strict time limits apply at every stage, and the complaint must identify the tax, the year and the precise ground \u2014 wrong base, wrong rate, wrong social-charge treatment or wrong surcharge. The most productive grounds in second-home files are strikingly concrete.<\/p>\n The first ground is valuation. As the February 2026 decision shows, the administration sometimes reassesses a declared price upwards to an estimated market value and bills the representative for the difference; the Conseil d’\u00c9tat’s answer is that the deed price governs unless concealment of part of the real price is proved (CE, 24 February 2026, No 496482<\/a>). A seller who kept bank transfer records matching the deed price, the agency mandate and the diagnosticians’ reports will normally win that fight. The second ground is the holding-period arithmetic: the allowance clock starts from the acquisition deed’s date, acquisitions by inheritance start at the death, and works only increase the purchase price where they were done by a contractor and are proved by invoices \u2014 do-it-yourself labour and unreceipted cash payments do not count. The third ground is the social-charge rate: files collected at 17.2 per cent where the seller was British-affiliated throughout can be reclaimed down to the 7.5 per cent solidarity levy on production of the affiliation evidence described above, on the strength of the BOFiP doctrine and the case law cited in section I (BOI-RFPI-PVINR-20-20<\/a>; CAA Marseille, 17 March 2020, No 19MA00148<\/a>). The fourth ground is the high-gains surcharge threshold: because the surcharge bites only above 50,000 euros of net taxable gain, a corrected base can pull the whole gain out of the surcharge.<\/p>\n Two broader arguments deserve mention with their limits stated honestly. The European-law comparison argument \u2014 that a non-resident must not be treated worse than a comparable resident \u2014 succeeded in reducing historic rates to 19 per cent, as the Conseil d’\u00c9tat confirmed when it rejected a claim for total discharge but preserved the reduction to the resident rate (CE, 23 June 2022, No 445785<\/a>); since Britain left the Union, that argument’s reach for British sellers is narrower than it was, and it should be pleaded as a complement to domestic grounds, not as the whole case. And where the administration has simply misapplied the treaty \u2014 for instance by denying the situs rule or by double-counting \u2014 the convention’s text and the elimination article are directly invocable (2008 Convention, Articles 14 and 24<\/a>). A 2020 Conseil d’\u00c9tat decision on Swiss-resident sellers of a Paris property, working through the treaty, the former exemption and the fallback 19 per cent rate, shows how methodically the courts layer treaty, statute and rate relief (CE, 9th and 10th chambers combined, 12 February 2020, No 415475<\/a>). The practical message is consistent across all these decisions: challenge early, challenge precisely, and challenge with the deed, the computation and the affiliation file in hand.<\/p>\n Selling a French second home from Britain after Brexit means accepting a clear division of labour between the two tax systems and then verifying every line of the French computation. France taxes the gain at its source under Article 244 bis A at 19 per cent for an individual, after the holding-period allowances of Article 150 VC have done their work over twenty-two years for income tax and thirty years for social charges, with the high-gains surcharge above 50,000 euros and social charges of 7.5 per cent for a British-affiliated seller \u2014 or 17.2 per cent where British affiliation cannot be shown \u2014 completing the bill. The sale itself cannot proceed without an accredited fiscal representative, the declaration travels on form 2048-IMM through the notaire at registration, and Britain then taxes the same gain with credit for the French tax under Articles 14 and 24 of the 2008 convention. Where the bill is wrong, the remedies are real: the deed price governs unless concealment is proved, the affiliation file can halve the social charges, and the administrative courts will enforce each of these rules. Prepared in that order \u2014 deed, allowances, affiliation, representative, declaration, British return \u2014 a cross-Channel sale stays a conveyancing transaction rather than becoming a dispute.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" British resident selling a French holiday home after Brexit: how France computes the gain under Article 244 bis A, the 19% levy, 7.5% or 17.2% social charges, the mandatory fiscal representative, the UK credit and how to challenge the bill.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":251031309,"featured_media":16366,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_kj_source_type":"","_kj_official_id":"","_kj_official_url":"","_kj_judilibre_id":"","_kj_jur":"","_kj_lieu":"","_kj_chambre":"","_kj_rg":"","_kj_date":"","activitypub_content_warning":"","activitypub_content_visibility":"","activitypub_max_image_attachments":4,"activitypub_interaction_policy_quote":"anyone","activitypub_status":"federated","footnotes":""},"categories":[80312,80314],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2142100","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-british-desk","category-decryptage"],"yoast_head":"\nB. The social charges question: 17.2 per cent or 7.5 per cent for a British-affiliated seller<\/h3>\n
II. Selling from across the Channel and challenging the bill<\/h2>\n
A. The conveyancing chain: notaire, declaration, accredited representative and the British tax return<\/h3>\n
B. How to challenge an excessive or wrongly computed French bill<\/h3>\n
Conclusion<\/h2>\n