Short-term tourist rentals in Montpellier in 2026: the quota of 770 has been reached

1. Can you still let a short-term tourist rental in Montpellier in 2026?

Three notions govern all the rest, and they are regularly confused.

The main residence is the home you occupy for at least eight months a year. The regulation exempts it from change-of-use authorisation, within the limit of nights set by the commune. In Montpellier, that limit is 90 days ; in the other communes covered by the regulation, it remains at 120.

Any other home falls under change of use, an authorisation issued by the mayor. It can be "personal", temporary and attached to you, or "real", permanent, attached to the property and subject to compensation.

The registration number, finally, is a thirteen-digit declaratory identifier, compulsory on all your listings. It is not an authorisation. You can hold one and still be in breach if the change of use is missing.

2. The quota of 770: why the door to the centre is closed

This is the point that sets Montpellier apart from most large cities. Elsewhere, the conditions have been tightened : floor area thresholds, heavier compensation, lower ceilings on nights. Here, a closed number has been set. The mechanism does not make access harder, it makes it unavailable until a place is freed up.

The practical consequence is direct. An owner in the quota zone who files an application today does not move into a stricter examination : they move into another regime, that of the real authorisation subject to compensation, applicable from the first square metre converted. We come back to it in chapter 5.

Two qualifications are worth knowing. First, homes located in a serviced residence, used as a main residence outside short-let periods, are excluded from the count against the threshold, without being exempt from authorisation for all that. Second, authorisations issued under the previous regulation and carrying a right to a three-year renewal keep that right, provided the application is made before the initial authorisation expires. Out of time, the application is treated as a new one and the compensation principle applies.

3. What changed on 1 January 2026

Taken on its own, each of these points looks technical. Together, they redefine the economics of short-term letting in Montpellier.

The move from three years renewable to four years firm is the most underestimated change. On the face of it, the duration lengthens ; in reality, the horizon shortens. An authorisation of three years renewable once opened up six years of visibility. Four years with no renewal is four years, at the end of which a complete application must be filed again and every criterion met again, within a framework that may have changed in the meantime.

The Montpellier context explains that severity. The city counted 310 240 inhabitants at the 2023 census, with growth of 1,4 % a year since 2017, one of the strongest in France. 67 % of households there are tenants, 15 to 24-year-olds represent 22,4 % of the population, and the poverty rate reaches 30,9 %. Against that, around 5 728 short-term tourist rentals were declared in the commune, of which more than 3 000 were second homes. It is that gap that the town council of Michaël Delafosse, re-elected on 22 March 2026, cites to justify the tightening.

4. The conditions your home must meet

These criteria are not formalities, and two of them deserve particular attention.

The energy performance certificate has become an entry filter. A home rated F or G cannot obtain a change-of-use authorisation in Montpellier. In a communal stock made up of 87 % apartments, including a significant share of small older units in the town centre, that rules out a far from negligible number of properties from the start. And the 2034 deadline, which will take the threshold to class D, must be built into any long-term profitability calculation.

Refusing an inspection means refusal of authorisation. The regulation is clear : any absence or refusal of an inspection within the processing period, attributable to the applicant, leads to rejection of the application. This is not boilerplate.

Two further rules, often discovered too late. In the event of a division of a home or of a lot within a building, an authorisation must be sought for each unit resulting from the division : splitting a large apartment into two studios does not get round the one-home-per-tax-household rule, it doubles the number of authorisations needed. And a property provided as compensation, once assigned to residential use, can never again be the subject of a personal authorisation for short-term letting.

5. Compensation: what it really involves

The compensation regime concerns every situation where the personal authorisation is not available : owners that are legal entities, applications covering more than one home per tax household, and applications made in the quota zone once the threshold has been reached. It applies from the first square metre converted.

In practice, two routes exist. You convert a commercial or office property into housing yourself, which requires a planning permission and a declaration certifying the completion and compliance of the works. Or you buy commercial-use rights from a third party, a specialist company or a social landlord, which carries out the conversion and provides you with the corresponding certificate.

One legal point finally, for owners tempted to challenge the scheme. In a decision of 11 June 2026, the Conseil d'État, the French supreme administrative court, upheld a comparable change-of-use regime with compensation, holding that it met an overriding reason of general interest drawn from the fight against the housing shortage and that it satisfied the proportionality test. Each regulation is assessed on its own features, but case law is now clearly oriented in favour of local authorities.

6. What do you risk if you let without authorisation?

The amount doubled with the Le Meur act of 19 November 2024, which took the ceiling under article L.651-2 of the French construction and housing code from 50 000 € to 100 000 €. The penalty payment, for its part, is calculated per day and per square metre : on a 50 m² apartment, a month's delay in restoring the property theoretically represents an amount out of all proportion to the income earned from letting.

Three useful clarifications. Intermediaries who facilitate the breach, through brokering, negotiating or making services available, also face up to 100 000 € per property : property management agencies are therefore directly exposed. False declarations and concealment of properties fall under article L.651-3, which provides for its own penalties. Finally, the change-of-use authorisation is always issued subject to the rights of third parties, in particular the terms of the lease and of the rules of the building : a municipal authorisation does not protect you from action by your owners' association.

7. What has changed at national level?

Two consequences to build in before any decision in Montpellier.

Classification of the furnished letting has become decisive. The gap between classified and unclassified is no longer marginal : a 50 % allowance against 30 %, and an income ceiling more than five times higher. On a property genuinely in operation, going through classification pays for itself in one season.

The tax cost of exiting has increased. Until February 2025, the depreciation deducted during operation was not recaptured at the time of sale. It now is, which raises the cost of selling a property long operated as a furnished letting. Have that capital gain calculated by your notary before you decide.

A national online registration service is also due to come into operation in the fourth quarter of 2026, under the decrees of 19 March 2026. Until it is in place, the scheme specific to Montpellier, with its thirteen-digit registration number, remains the only one that applies.

8. Sell, let long term or wait?

Three scenarios present themselves, and they are not equivalent depending on where your property is.

1. Your property is in the quota zone. That is the most constrained situation. With no place available, short-term letting requires compensation in the same district, a heavy operation rarely within reach of a private individual. Long-term letting, furnished or unfurnished, becomes the benchmark option again : in a city where 67 % of households are tenants and where the population grows by 1,4 % a year, demand is not lacking. The mobility lease, from one to ten months, is particularly suited to the student population of Montpellier.

2. Your property is outside the quota zone. The personal authorisation remains available, provided you meet the criteria and operate only one home in the commune. Plan on four years, however, not beyond : that is the horizon the regulation gives you, and the 2034 energy performance deadline is drawing closer.

3. You hold several properties or you operate through a company. Systematic compensation changes the economic equation. The question becomes one of asset strategy : hold on with long-term letting, or sell to redeploy. In the latter case, plan ahead for the recapture of depreciation in the capital gain with a tax adviser.

In every case, the decision starts with a figure : what your property is worth today. To place it from the real transactions in your district, you can use our valuation tool below, free of charge, or consult our prices per m² in Montpellier district by district.