🌟 Guide for owners in Nice to rent your apartment on Airbnb or Abritel 🌟
First of all, register with the City of Nice. This registration is mandatory and will be used at least for the payment of the tourist tax. 📋
At this level, if the apartment is your main residence, unless prohibited by your co-ownership, it is possible to rent your “home” for 120 nights per year.
If, on the other hand , the property you are renting is a second home, then you will have to ask the Town Hall for a “change of use” of this property into a “furnished tourist property”, i.e. a “commercial” use. 💼 And here, you will have to check if the co-ownership regulations allow this type of use in the “use of the private portions” section. The terms “bourgeois dwelling” or “exclusively for residential use” or equivalent are eliminatory. Commercial use must be possible on the upper floor of the apartments. 🏢 It should be noted that an authorization of the liberal professions has nothing to do with it and is not sufficient because it is not a use considered “commercial”.
As such, more than about 80% (difficult to measure) of the buildings in our beautiful city do not allow this use and therefore you will not be able to rent your second home in this way but only as an unfurnished or furnished rental for 3 years or 1 year or as a student lease or equivalent. 📜 If the city of Nice grants you this change of use in a building, it will be valid for 1 year tacitly renewable 5 times, i.e. a maximum of 6 years and non-renewable and for only one property per tax household. 🏠 In the event of non-compliance with this obligation, the town hall of Nice has been taking legal action against the owners for more than a year, read this very interesting article by Maître Diaz, a lawyer in real estate law in Nice: https://tinyurl.com/airbnbvuemer
Update January 2024 : Until recently, it was also required to present the extract of the co-ownership by-laws, attesting that they did not oppose the change of use. Otherwise, the agreement of the co-ownership had to be produced. However, on Monday, January 31, 2024, the Administrative Court annulled this new regulation. The city of Nice has announced that it is appealing this decision, saying that the court “shows itself to be totally against the grain”.
We specify here that even if the co-ownership regulations are no longer requested while waiting for the City of Nice to appeal, this does not “de facto” lead to an authorization BECAUSE the co-ownership and the syndicate council of the building who hold the rules of the building, can initiate proceedings against any co-owner who does not respect the regulations and this happens… regularly by letters of formal notice, then put to the vote to take legal action against the co-owner with a claim for heavy compensation, etc. So be very careful at this level, including in this period, since January 2024, of “legal transition” between the old and this new rule, to the City Hall, which intends to reconsider this obligation to provide the RC.
Update July 2024:
Since July 15, for second homes, owners will still have to obtain authorization from the Town Hall BEFORE being able to offer their property for short-term rental BUT from now on, it will be valid for one year, compared to six years currently.
To this end, the City Council unanimously adopted a text on Monday 15 July aimed at “tightening the regulations (…) to control and supervise the development of tourist rentals”.
In concrete terms, it “limits the duration of temporary authorisations to one year”, compared to “six years” currently. They “will no longer be tacitly renewable”, explained the mayor, Christian Estrosi.
“The owner will have to apply by mail two months before the end of his authorization. In the event of proven nuisance, we will not renew these authorisations,” Christian Estrosi added in a press release.
What about individual houses? What can we do?
For individual villas, the rules to be respected are exactly the same. If the house is rented in its entirety, if it is your main residence it will be a maximum of 120 nights per year, and if it is your second home, then you must make a change of use to the City of Nice which will probably grant it to you unless a subdivision regulation or specifications, even an old one, restricts commercial use. You will therefore have the agreement for 6 years. If you rent a part of your house with mandatory independent access, i.e. an apartment in your house, you must ask the town hall for the change of use in the same way. If now you have a house whose volumes you have divided to have 2 or 3 apartments, well only one of them will be eligible for a maximum of 6 years for the authorization of the town hall for short-term rental, and you will not have the right to do the same for the other apartments in your house since it is possible for only one apartment per tax household once. On the other hand, for these other apartments in this house, you can apply for a mixed rental permit which allows you to rent to a student by the CROUS and must be a CAF beneficiary for 9 months for example and up to a maximum of 3 months per year in seasonal rental without any other restriction of validity period on the other hand. But be careful only for properties rented in this way and for which the tax household has already used the authorization of a first property for 6 years.
For even more details see the very well done and complete article of a key collection company, by following this link https://keynest.com/fr/blog/rglementation-airbnb-nice
By following these steps, you will be able to rent out your property with peace of mind and optimize your income potential. 🏡
