Buying your own commercial premises or offices in France: what to know before signing
Buying your own premises means no longer paying rent for your own working tool and choosing your address for the long term. This dossier is written for the shopkeeper, the professional and the company buying to occupy: it says what is really bought, what to check and how Home Select runs the search.
Atlantic Coast -Bordeaux -A square and its terraces
By Jean Mascla, founder of Home SelectUpdated · 6 min read
Premises, goodwill, leasehold right: what is being bought?
Three things are sold under the word premises, and they must not be confused. The premises, the murs, are the property itself, the shop, the office floor, the workshop, with their share of the co-ownership. The business goodwill, the fonds de commerce, is the activity: the clientele, the sign, the equipment, the lease. The leasehold right, the droit au bail, is a tenant’s place in a commercial lease, bought to move in without buying the property.
This dossier deals with the premises, bought to be occupied by whoever buys them. Home Select searches for premises, vacant or occupied, for companies, shopkeepers and professionals; the sale of a business goodwill or a leasehold right belongs to other professionals, whom Home Select can point you to.
Buying vacant or occupied premises?
Vacant premises can be occupied from the deed: it is the case sought by those who buy for themselves. Occupied premises are bought with their commercial lease: the sitting tenant stays, the lease runs to its term, and at expiry the tenant has a right to renewal. Refusing that renewal to take the premises back requires, in principle, the payment of an eviction indemnity.
A commercial lease lasts at least nine years; the tenant may leave at each three-year period, the landlord only in limited cases. Before buying occupied premises in order to occupy them one day, read the lease, its expiry date, its clauses on use and rent review, and have a lawyer price what taking them back would cost.
Authorised use, co-ownership: what will you be able to do there?
Premises have an authorised use, recorded in the planning documents and often in the co-ownership rules: retail, offices, craft, housing. Changing it, turning a shop into offices or a workshop into a home, requires planning consent and sometimes the agreement of the co-ownership.
Use as a dwelling follows another rule: in towns of more than 200,000 inhabitants and in the three departments of the inner ring around Paris, turning a dwelling into professional premises, to set up a practice for instance, requires an authorisation to change its use, coupled in some towns with a compensation. The co-ownership rules may also limit the activities allowed in the building.
How to read the price of commercial premises?
The price of premises is formed on location above all: the footfall in front of the window, visibility, the street and its neighbouring shops for a shop; accessibility, transport, parking and the image of the address for offices. The usable area, the ceiling height, the street frontage, the storage and the technical condition then make the gap between two neighbouring premises.
The public DVF register of sales also records sales of premises. Home Select reads them street by street, with the references of the sector’s professionals, to place a price before any offer. Transfer duties apply as for a home, unless the sale is subject to VAT; the notaire states it from the preliminary contract.
Atlantic Coast -Bordeaux -A square and its terraces
What should be checked before buying your own premises?
The title and the co-ownership unit: area, share, common parts used, authorised sign and terrace.
The authorised use: what the local plan and the co-ownership rules allow there.
The current lease if there is one: expiry, rent, clauses on use and review, the tenant’s rights.
The technical condition: electricity, ventilation, extraction for a catering activity, surveys, accessibility.
Coming obligations: works voted by the co-ownership and, for commercial buildings of 1,000 m² and more, the targets for reducing energy consumption.
Home Select checks every document of the file before you commit; have the fit-out and compliance works priced by an architect or firms of your choice, before the offer.
Where Home Select searches for premises
Home Select searches for commercial premises and offices in the major cities where it works: Lyon, Marseille, Nice, Toulouse, Bordeaux and Montpellier, and in the towns around them. The search covers the listings of the specialist portals, the letting and sales networks and the off-market, through notaires, owners and a network of 15,000 professional partners.
A buyer’s agent specialised in commercial premises runs these searches: brief, locations, viewings, reading of leases and rules, negotiation. The commercial property and office search details the method and the cases handled.
Home Select’s fees for premises
For the purchase of premises, Home Select applies the scale of the Exclusive offer: 2.5% of the net purchase price, minimum €10,000 incl. VAT, plus 10% of the negotiated reduction, paid on success, at the final deed. No advance is requested.
For the search of premises to rent, fees are due on success, at the signing of the lease, and set out in the mandate. In both cases, Home Select works for you alone: it has no premises to place and is never paid by the seller or the landlord.
Frequently asked questions
Is it better to buy the premises or to stay a tenant?
Buying fixes the cost of your premises and the address for the long term; staying a tenant keeps the freedom to move and leaves cash for the business. The answer depends on how long you plan to stay, on the location and on the financing: an accountant and your bank work it out with you.
Can you buy occupied premises to move in?
Yes, but not straight away: the sitting tenant keeps the lease until expiry and has a right to renewal. Taking the premises back requires, in principle, an eviction indemnity. Read the lease and have a lawyer price the recovery before the offer.
Can a practice be set up in an apartment?
Often, but two rules must be checked: the co-ownership rules, which may limit activities, and, in large cities and the inner ring around Paris, the authorisation to change the use, sometimes coupled with a compensation. Home Select checks these points before you commit.
Does Home Select search for businesses for sale?
No. Home Select searches for premises, vacant or occupied, and premises to rent; the sale of a business goodwill or a leasehold right belongs to other professionals, whom Home Select can point you to.
In which cities does Home Select search for premises?
In the major cities where Home Select works, Lyon, Marseille, Nice, Toulouse, Bordeaux and Montpellier, and in the towns around them. A buyer’s agent specialised in commercial premises runs these searches with Home Select’s partner network.
What are the fees for buying premises?
The scale of the Exclusive offer: 2.5% of the net purchase price, minimum €10,000 incl. VAT, plus 10% of the negotiated reduction, paid on success, at the deed. For a rental, fees are due at the signing of the lease and set out in the mandate.
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60 rue François 1er, 75008 Paris · FCI member
FeesOne month’s rent excluding charges, plus VAT, with a minimum of €2,000 including VAT. Payable only when the lease is signed. No application fee.
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