aliem

Hi all,

I'm splitting my time between Grenoble and the UK for the next few years and I'm looking for a long term let. In the last week I've found somewhere to rent through an agent. However, I'm now getting stuck with what they require to satisfy the landlords insurance. This is partly due to my work arrangements, in that I've been employed with an organisation up until Jan, and now I work for this organisation on a freelance basis. Due the slightly more complex situation I've agreed with the landlord to set up a caution bancaire with my French bank. This gives confidence to the landlord that he will be paid. The bank has asked me to provide my 3 last payment slips (which I have) and a avis d'imposition. I have sent them my UK tax stuff as I have no avis d'imposition. I will wait to see what happens around this, but can any one else give any pearls of wisdom with what you've done when renting a property in France?

Many thanks,
Ali

Novocastrian

No expert here (some will be along soon) but I think you should be OK assuming that your tax returns show sufficient income for the rent. It's certainly a good thing that you already have a french bank account.

dmu

Hi, and welcome to the forum!
How long were you employed with the organisation as a salarié(e)? Maybe not long enough to have sent in a Déclaration des Revenus last Spring, but you'll have that joy soon, after which the Impôts will send you an Avis d'Imposition with the amounts to be paid on last year's salary. If your income is below a certain level, they send an Avis de Non-Imposition, in which case hopefully your Bank will accept to provide the Caution Bancaire...
Good luck!

aliem

Forgot to say, that all my tax has been in the UK. Sorry if that wasn't clear.

dmu

Your organisation is based in the UK, then, and your income tax was PAYE?
You should still declare your last-year's world-wide income to the French Impôts this Spring and the French and UK Tax Authorities will sort it out between them.
There are other questions to consider, now that you are working freelance. How long do you intend to stay in each country? The Authorities will need to decide where you are Tax-Resident, and you must set up a business structure here if you haven't already done so. If you post again on those aspects, some one in the know, who might not necessarily have seen this thread, will come along to advise.

EuroTrash

As regards the rental, impossible to advise really. Normally, letting agencies in France are very strict and require a permanent work contract or a hefty amount lodged in a special bank account as guarantee, so you'll have to negotiate with them and your bank.

It's not clear how long you've been working in France for, but as said, if you are going to work here freelance you will need to be registered or operate through some official legal setup so that you can't be accused of 'working on the black'.

If you'd been working freelance in the UK you could maybe have got a workers S1-equivalent from the UK to cover your activities in France, but it seems that you have only just gone freelance so that probably won't be an option.

Again as said, you will need to speak to both tax authorities and get it agreed where your liabilities are, what you declare where and who is responsible for your social security cover. That said, working freelance for only one 'client', especially when that 'client' is a former 'employer', may not be well-regarded by either country if they scrutinise it too carefully - without knowing the circumstances, at first sight it is going to look suspiciously like 'concealed employment', so tread carefully.

aliem

Perhaps I needed to be clearer in my first post. The time I spend in France is purely for holiday purposes-spending time in the mountains and learning french. The reason for my post is that I want to rent somewhere more permanently rather than having to get holiday lets each time I visit France, and I wanted to see how others went about this?

Novocastrian

That's actually what I thought you meant. But still, the 183 days tax residency rule would apply even if you don't work while you're here. Best to know that I think.

EuroTrash

Sorry, totally misunderstood what you are planning to do.

Can't really help - I once looked into renting but couldn't figure out any way to meet the agency's criteria, so gave up on the idea. The problem is that French legislation gives tenants a lot of protection. Rental contracts are for 3 years minimum on the landlord's side, and the law makes it difficult for a landlord to evict a tenant within those 3 years although the tenant can give notice whenever he likes. So not surprisingly, landlords don't want to risk getting stuck for 3 years with a bad tenant. Hence when I enquired, the agency required the equivalent of 3 years rent to be put into a holding account, because I didn't have references from previous landlords and couldn't show them a permanent work contract.

However, that was nearly 10 years ago and things may have got less strict since then.

EuroTrash

I doubt this would be a concern. Even if France wanted it to, HMRC wouldn't agree to hand over a permanent UK resident who continues to do all their work in the UK, continues to own a house there lives in there for 6 months of the year. The UK would still seem to be quite clearly their centre of economic interest. Worldwide income still declared in the UK, no income to declare in France, so the impots would not be interested.

Novocastrian

OK. Thanks for the clarification, but I'm not absolutely certain it's so simple. I realize it wouldn't cost more but I don't fancy the hassle of declaring world wide income in France and (in my case) in Canada and then offsetting the Canadian taxes against the French ones. I don't even know which of the two countries has the higher rates in my bracket and my solution to not having to find out the hard way is to be here this year for a bit less than 6 months total.

It's not the only reason but an important one.

EuroTrash

The so-called 183-day rule only really comes into play as a tie-break, in situations where you own or don't own property in both countries, you work roughly equal time and earn roughly equal income in both, have equal domestic and family ties in both and spend roughly equal amounts of time in both. All these factors are used to determine where you are resident and tax resident and normally economic/family ties factors are sufficient for the authorities to make a decision. If none of the other factors is decisive, it comes down to counting the days.

Novocastrian

I'm sure you're right but as you know I (we) own property in both countries, I'm earning income from my Canadian job as we speak whilst being in France, we have family ties in both countries (although stronger ones in Canada, marginally), why take a risk of stirring up a bureaucratic nightmare just for a couple of extra weeks here this year?

As said I believe you're correct though. But I'm not one to mess with the system in whichever country I live (and there have been several).

EuroTrash

Very wise. I wouldn't argue with that at all.

cyrian

That may be the case for UK - France but the Canada - France Treaty may be different.
The USA - France Treaty is certainly different from the Uk - France one.
If a US citizen is resident in France for more than 183 days then they need to complete a french tax return.
I have US friends who have researched this in detail and who live 6 months (under 183 days) in France and 6 months in Florida