The real estate market has been going through a serious crisis for two years and while awaiting decisions from Bercy concerning the 2025 budget, professionals in the sector were hoping for a strong sign from the government. Alas, many were disillusioned when they discovered the finance bill (PLF) for 2025, presented last Thursday.
“Michel Barnier had displayed significant ambitions regarding housing,” recalls Pierre Madec, economist at the French Observatory of Economic Conditions (OFCE) and specialist in real estate issues. But we do not find these ambitions in the measures announced. In my opinion, they are not up to the crisis that new construction is experiencing today. »
“Rather worrying”
In detail, the PLF first ratified the end of the Pinel system, which allows you to benefit from a tax reduction in exchange for the financing of new housing intended for rental. In the document, not a line refers to it, confirming its scheduled disappearance on December 31, 2024. Not a surprise as Pinel was criticized because it was considered expensive (1.5 to 2 billion per year) and not effective enough: “The The problem is not so much removing it as not re-injecting the budgetary savings generated by its removal into a new system,” regrets Pierre Madec.
On the energy renovation aspect, MaPrimeRénov credits will drop by around one billion euros compared to 2024, or 2.3 billion in 2025: “The objectives are less ambitious than last year and it is rather worrying because the need for renovation is very important,” breathes Pierre Madec.
Real estate market: what if the time was (finally) for a rebound?
Real estate has not yet emerged from the construction, marketing and credit crisis that the entire sector has been going through for more than a year. However, some positive signs suggest that the worst is perhaps behind us
Parliament will decide
The zero-interest loan (PTZ) for first-time buyers will be extended to the entire territory whereas until now it only applied in tense areas. Will single-family homes be eligible? It would not be “absurd” “outside of hyper-urban areas and as long as they do not consume too much space”, declared the Minister of Housing, Valérie Létard on Saturday. “It will have a significant budgetary cost,” notes Pierre Madec, wondering about “the government’s objectives in terms of ending land artificialization. »
Finally, the tax loophole for furnished non-professional rentals (LMNP) seems doomed. Applied to long and medium-term rentals, but also to Airbnb-type rentals, it allows you to benefit from generous tax reductions but is considered too attractive compared to long-term rentals. Problem, according to Pierre Madec: nothing is done, in return for this elimination, to “make the taxation on year-round rentals more attractive”.
All these measures, more dedicated to “increasing tax revenue” than to defending “housing policy”, judges Pierre Madec, are still only projects which will probably be amended during debates in Parliament. What will be left at the end of the year, when the budget is voted on? Parliamentarians “will have to take their responsibilities,” warned Michel Barnier.
