Reference date (date de référence)

In French compulsory purchase (expropriation), two dates govern the calculation of compensation. The first is the date at which the property is valued: the Expropriation Code takes the date of the first-instance decision, with market prices at that time. The second is the reference date: it serves to freeze what the property is, that is its actual use and the planning rules applicable to it, so as to exclude changes in value brought about by the announcement of the scheme itself. Land that has become developable thanks to the public project, or a building put up to inflate the compensation, are not taken into account.

As a general rule, the reference date is set one year before the opening of the public inquiry preceding the déclaration d’utilité publique (declaration of public interest). Where the property lies in an area covered by a PLU (local planning plan), it corresponds to the date on which the most recent instrument publishing, approving, revising or amending the plan and delimiting the zone became enforceable. In pre-emption matters, the Planning Code applies a similar rule.

Where the rule comes from

Article L. 322-2 of the French Expropriation Code fixes the valuation date and the reference date, and specifies that only the actual use of the property at that date is taken into consideration. Article L. 213-4 of the French Planning Code refers, for the price of a pre-empted property, to the rules of compulsory purchase, with its own reference date. The Charte de l’expertise en évaluation immobilière (French property valuation charter) recalls the framework at Title II § 8.13 and deals with expropriation compensation at Title III § 1.20.

In a valuation report

I identify the reference date from the procedural documents (order opening the inquiry, dates on which the local plan became enforceable) and state it at the head of my analysis. I classify the property at that date: building land or not, agricultural, residential or commercial use, letting situation. I then value the property so classified at market conditions at the valuation date, setting aside comparables whose price has been influenced by the scheme. The report keeps these two steps clearly separate, because the debate with the government commissioner often turns on the classification at the reference date.

Example

A 2,500 m² plot is expropriated for a new road. At the date of judgment, in 2026, the sector is zoned urban and building plots sell at €120 per m². But at the reference date, fixed at 15 May 2022, the plot was in the agricultural zone of the plan then in force, used as pasture. It is therefore valued as agricultural land, at 2026 prices for that type of property: €1.20 per m², or €3,000, not €300,000. If, conversely, the developable zoning predated the reference date, the classification as building land would be secured.

Not to be confused with

The valuation date fixes the moment at which prices are observed; the reference date fixes the legal status of the property. The date of the expropriation order governs the physical condition of the property (article L. 322-1 of the same Code).