A company exercises its right of abandonment (droit de délaissement, the owner’s right to require a public body to buy land it has earmarked) over plots in a concerted development zone, and the judge sets its indemnity. To establish it, the Paris court of appeal relies on comparables the urban community had cited in its submissions without producing the deeds of sale, on the ground that they carried the publication references giving access to them. The company sees a breach of the adversarial principle. On 19 September 2024 the Cour de cassation (the French supreme court for civil matters), in a reported decision, dismissed the appeal: comparables “drawn from databases accessible to the public”, provided they carry the particulars listed in article R. 112 A-1 of the tax procedure code and the publication references, “put the parties in a position to debate their validity or relevance in adversarial proceedings”. For anyone preparing an expropriation memorandum, this is the definition of an admissible reference.
The facts
A company owning plots within the perimeter of a concerted development zone exercises its right of abandonment in favour of the urban community Grand Paris Sud Seine-Essonne-Sénart. The Paris court of appeal, on 15 June 2023, sets the indemnities due to it.
The company appeals against the setting of the total dispossession indemnity. It criticises the court of appeal for taking into consideration the comparables cited, but not produced, by the urban community, on the ground that they carried the publication references giving access to the deeds and their characteristics; in its view, the judge may rely on documents only if the parties have been able to debate them.
The decision
The third civil chamber dismissed the appeal (Cass. 3e civ., 19 September 2024, no. 23-19.783, reported). “To set the amount of the expropriation or abandonment indemnity, the judge has a sovereign discretion to assess the comparables drawn from the selected deeds of transfer on which each party relies for the valuation it proposes, provided the parties have been able to debate them in adversarial proceedings.”
“Comparables cited by the parties in their submissions, drawn from databases accessible to the public, provided they carry the particulars listed in article R. 112 A-1 of the tax procedure code and are accompanied by the publication references allowing, where appropriate, the deeds of transfer concerned to be obtained from the land registry, put the parties in a position to debate their validity or relevance in adversarial proceedings.” The ground, which assumed that a comparable cannot be relied on without production of the deed, is unfounded.
What this changes for valuation
What an admissible reference is. Article R. 112 A-1 of the tax procedure code lists the particulars the tax administration discloses on transfers: cadastral references, address, nature and area of the property, date and price of the sale, publication references. A reference carrying them, drawn from public databases, the French land value requests database, the Patrim service, notarial databases, can be debated without the deed being produced; the opponent can obtain it from the land registry if it disputes the reference. The valuation report therefore presents each comparable with those particulars and its publication reference, which makes it usable as it stands in a memorandum.
The deed remains useful when the characteristics matter. Price and area do not say everything: a sale may include furniture, an easement, a lease in progress, a special condition, or concern land whose buildability differs. When the valuer relies on a reference whose particulars change its relevance, he obtains the deed or discards it; when he disputes a reference of the other side, it is for him to produce the deed that disqualifies it. The article on the proof of utilities in a development zone shows that the burden of proof in expropriation is allocated item by item.
Selection and adjustments must be reasoned. The judge “has a sovereign discretion to assess the comparables”; he is bound neither by the average of the references nor by those of one party. The weight of a report therefore lies in the reasoning behind the selection, location, date, composition, planning status, and the adjustments, rather than in the number of references. Ten well-chosen and explained sales are worth more than fifty lines extracted from a database. The glossary describes what a comparable is and how it is adjusted.
Abandonment is valued like expropriation. The ruling refers to “the expropriation or abandonment indemnity”: the owner who calls on the authority to buy its property, in a development zone or a reserved site, obtains an indemnity set under the same rules, at the reference date and according to the actual use of the property. The report therefore applies the same method, with the same requirements on references, whether the property is expropriated or abandoned. The guide on expropriated business premises describes the procedure.
For the government commissioner as for the parties. The government commissioner produces his own comparables, drawn from the tax databases, and his submissions are debated on the same footing. The expropriated owner’s valuer checks every line, dates, areas, nature of the property, and flags to the judge those that are not comparable; it is verification work more than valuation, but it often makes the difference.
What the valuer takes from it
- A comparable drawn from a public database, with the particulars of article R. 112 A-1 of the tax procedure code and its publication reference, can be debated without production of the deed.
- The judge has a sovereign discretion over the selected references; the reasoning behind the selection and the adjustments makes the value of the report.
- The deed of sale is produced when its special characteristics change the relevance of the reference.
- The abandonment indemnity follows the same valuation rules as the expropriation indemnity.
- The report presents each reference with its particulars and its publication reference, ready for the memorandum.
Further reading
The Compulsory purchase and pre-emption page describes the assignment, its timescale and its fee. The guide My business premises are compulsorily purchased and the glossary entries comparable, date de référence and commissaire du gouvernement complement this article. On the same theme: Compulsory purchase in a ZAC: who must prove the utilities? and Inheritance tax in France: a later resale does not fix the value. The decision is available on Légifrance.
What next
An expropriation or abandonment indemnity to defend, and comparables to select and document?
I build the file of references with the particulars required by the tax procedure code and the publication references, discard non-comparable sales and give reasons for each adjustment, for the memorandum of the expropriated owner or of the acquiring authority.
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