More than a million taxpayers had been wrongly imposed, forcing the State to fall for 1.3 billion euros: a wound for already exsangues public finances.
This new declarative obligation arose from the abolition of the housing tax the same year.
The owners had to provide the administration with the names, first names, date and places of birth of the occupants in order to allow the taxman to identify among 71 million premises in France those who had to remain taxed: in particular under the tax on second homes, or that on vacant housing.
Declarative flaws
But the state tool, developed for 5 years at a cost of 56.4 million euros, had aroused considerable dysfunctions, pointed out by the wise men of rue Cambon, and by several union organizations which denounced the consequences for the services on the ground.
Three campaigns later, the taxman wants to make amends.
The platform is now integrated into the income tax declaration whose campaign started on April 11 and will end at the latest on June 5. The declaration of the occupants will continue until “end of June”, details the Directorate General of Public Finances (DGFIP).
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But declarative flaws remain. Less on the side of “small” than “large” owners (more than 200 property).
The first, which hold “three or four goods, sometimes a little more,” said 82 % of their occupation situations in 2023, and 88 % the following year, specifies the head of the tax management service at the DGFIP, Olivier Thouvenin.
To date, Bercy records 90 % of declarants for the current campaign, supports François Rollo, one of the officials of the taxman interviewed by AFP.
The “black point” of local authorities
Social landlords, communities, promoters, banks, SCI owners: the DGFIP lists some 3,000 large owners, of which only “a few hundred” represent most of the housing stock (around 70 %).
The declarative breaches of this category of owner was one of the “weaknesses of weaknesses” of the 2023 campaign, recognizes Olivier Thouvenin, with only 45 % of declaration rate of the occupants, then 78 % in 2024.
-A figure that the administration hopes slightly higher in 2025.
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The administration ensures that it has taken many measures intended to better accompany them … but a “black point” persists on the side of local authorities, some of which are among the most important donors.
And in 2024, only 50 % of communities had declared their occupation situations, details Olivier Thouvenin.
A situation which can be explained according to him by an ignorance of their own heritage, or by difficulties in identifying the occupants of premises whose management they have delegated: for example a barracks of firefighters.
This year, communities had the opportunity to delegate the care to identify the occupants in the effective managers of the premises, he underlines.
Fines of 150 euros per property
This identification problem is less present for social landlords who manage premises directly and with which “an older file exchange tradition” exists, points out Grégory Berthelot, assistant director of tax management at the DGFIP.
If the small owners will be spared by the financial sanctions in 2025, large owners will be able to be inflicted a fine of 150 euros per property.
“We have identified a certain number which have an obligation but declare us a little anything, anything, or even nothing at all,” says Olivier Thouvenin.
Some have difficulty identifying their occupants, but others “do not make a special effort to know them,” he said.
In the end, before the threat of a financial sanction, the declarative breach was above all detrimental to the tenant potentially imposed wrongly and which was to regularize its situation.
Apart from the fine, “the owner does not necessarily have an interest in acting,” concluded Olivier Thouvenin.
