The same studio, two categories of income

Mr Vasseur lets his studio for 650 € a month, that is 7 800 € a year. Let unfurnished, the standard allowance leaves him 5 460 € taxable. Let furnished, it leaves only 3 900 €. The same property, the same rent, a 1 560 € gap in the tax base. Before you read on: where does that difference come from, and up to what amount does it hold?

Two categories of income, not two variants

Letting unfurnished and letting furnished are not two ways of doing the same thing. The rent from an unfurnished dwelling is property income; the rent from a furnished one is an industrial and commercial profit. These are two distinct tax categories, each with its own rules.

The most visible consequence is the allowance under the standard regime. The unfurnished regime deducts 30 % of receipts for costs; the furnished one deducts 50 % for a long-term letting. On the same rent, the base differs by a fifth.

The second consequence is less well known and cuts the other way. Property income bears social levies at the reduced rate of 17.2 %; profits from furnished letting fall under the ordinary rate, that is 18.6 % since 1 January 2026.

The 1.4-point gap does not offset the twenty points of allowance, but it exists and appears in any serious comparison. Applying 17.2 % to furnished rental income is a common error, which understates the real charge.

Three kinds of furnished letting, three treatments

The furnished standard regime does not know a single treatment but three. Long-term letting and the classified holiday let share the 83 600 € threshold and the 50 % allowance. The unclassified holiday let is treated separately.

For the latter, the threshold falls to 15 000 € of receipts and the allowance to 30 %. A seasonal landlord who has not had the property classified therefore moves to the real regime from 15 001 € collected, with the accounting duties that follow.

Classification of a holiday let thus becomes a tax act as much as a commercial one. It changes nothing about the property let: it changes the applicable threshold and twenty points of allowance, which often weighs more than the cost of the procedure.

A floor rule applies to all: the allowance cannot be less than 305 €. It only bites on very small receipts, but it explains why a marginal letting produces no taxable income at all.

Non-professional or professional, the boundary

Non-professional furnished landlord status is not a choice but a finding. It applies for as long as annual receipts stay below 23 000 €, or for as long as they stay below the household's other earned income.

The two conditions are alternatives, and that is what makes the switch less frequent than people fear. A household whose salaries exceed its rents stays non-professional, whatever the receipts collected.

The distinction matters above all for the treatment of losses. As a non-professional, a loss is offset only against income of the same kind, for ten years. It never lightens the household's overall income.

A last difference decides more cases than the allowance itself. An unfurnished let is governed by a three-year lease renewable by tacit agreement; a furnished one by a one-year lease, or nine months for a student, with a shorter notice period on both sides.

The tax comparison therefore never settles the choice on its own. A landlord who wants stability of occupation and low management effort may rationally accept the smaller allowance that unfurnished letting carries.