The top holiday destination France may be about to join its European neighbours in regulating tourist accommodation, as members of parliament have agreed on a joint version of a bill aimed at better regulating the market for accommodation such as Airbnb.
As a result, British tourists hoping to visit France may soon also struggle to find a short-term rental listing in many iconic cities on short-term rental sites.
On Monday, senators and deputies agreed in a joint committee to further regulate short-term tourist-furnished rentals. Once parliamentarians ratify the text in early November – on November 5 in the Senate and November 7 in the National Assembly—mayors will be able to better control their number and duration, as the demand is becoming increasingly urgent.
This text is inspired by the bill passed by the National Assembly in January and then by the Senate in the spring before the Assembly’s dissolution in June.
The aim is to modify taxation to discourage property owners from renting to tourists. Currently, Airbnb-type rentals are more profitable for owners than renting to year-round tenants – one of the reasons why the real estate market is in crisis across almost the entire country, but even more so in cities and tourist areas.
Airbnb, for which France is the second-largest market, is present in more than 29,000 communes across the country. The company lamented this proposed law in a statement sent to AFP: “We regret the addition of measures targeting occasional rentals that will have no effect on rental market imbalances,” stated the platform.
Some mayors have been warning for years about skyrocketing rents due to a lack of long-term housing, including the mayor of Chamonix, Eric Fournier: “We have families, young people, who can no longer settle or stay,” he laments, now welcoming advances, “notably the possible establishment of quotas for furnished rentals in tourist areas.”
Mr Fournier also approves of the possibility of designating zones specifically reserved for constructing primary residences. “It’s truly a text that allows us to improve the balances between the tourist population and the permanent population.”
It poses a real problem for young people and seasonal workers, for example, who are looking for reasonably priced accommodation but cannot find any.
In Paris, where Airbnb arrived ten years ago, there are over 60,000 housing listings each year, except during the Olympic and Paralympic Games period when the offer doubled.
The tax allowance for furnished rentals should decrease from 71 percent to 50 percent for classified furnished properties, with a cap lowered to €77,700 (£65,000). For non-classified tourist rentals, the allowance should decrease from 50 percent to 30 percent as long as the person renting their properties does not exceed €15,000 (£12,500) in annual income.
The tax allowance for unfurnished housing could increase. The goal is to achieve more or less comparable rates so that owners no longer have a fiscal interest in renting a furnished property rather than an unfurnished one.
Parliamentarians also want to allow mayors to reduce the rental durations of primary residences from 120 to 90 days, one of the points proposed by co-rapporteur Inaki Echaniz, PS deputy for Pyrénées-Atlantiques. Compared to unanimity today, they can decide to ban seasonal rentals with a two-thirds majority vote.
“Today, we don’t know who is absent from their own home for four months a year, whereas 90 days corresponds to two months of summer holidays plus small holidays, so it’s a principle of reality. It helps limit fraud.”
