A municipality acquired plots by compulsory purchase (expropriation); the owners kept a garage that opens immediately onto the land taken. The Court of Appeal refused them any compensation for the loss of its use: no undertaking to create an easement had been recorded, and the reinvestment allowance (indemnité de remploi) would cover the costs. By a reported decision of 29 March 2018, the Cour de cassation (the French supreme court for civil matters) quashed that part of the ruling: the loss lay “in the landlocking resulting directly from the acquisition of the plots by the municipality” and “was not covered by the reinvestment allowance” (translated from the French). For the valuer, landlocking of the property kept is a separate head of loss to quantify.
The facts
A municipality became the owner of plots belonging to two private individuals, designated together in the decision as les consorts Y…; the owners kept a garage and claimed, in addition to the principal compensation for dispossession (indemnité principale) and the reinvestment allowance, €30,000 for loss of enjoyment and use of that garage.
On 30 November 2016, the Toulouse Court of Appeal set both indemnities but rejected the garage claim. It held that the garage, still the owners’ property, “opens immediately onto the expropriated plot”, that the record of the site visit (transport sur les lieux) “contains no undertaking to create an easement”, that “determining an easement does not fall within the jurisdiction of the expropriation judge” and that “the reinvestment allowance includes costs of all kinds normally incurred to acquire property of the same kind”.
The owners appealed against the amount of both indemnities and against the rejection of the garage claim.
The decision
The Court first dismissed the ground directed against the amount of the principal compensation and of the reinvestment allowance, which thus remained as set on appeal (Cass. 3e civ., 29 March 2018, appeal no. 17-11.507, reported).
It quashed, however, the rejection of the garage claim, under articles L. 321-1 and R. 322-5 of the Expropriation Code (Code de l’expropriation pour cause d’utilité publique). The first provides that the indemnities cover the whole of the direct, material and certain loss caused by the expropriation; the second governs the reinvestment allowance. The Court of Appeal had breached those provisions, “whereas the loss alleged lay in the landlocking resulting directly from the acquisition of the plots by the municipality and was not covered by the reinvestment allowance”.
The quashing was limited to the rejection of the €30,000 claim; the case was sent back on that point to the Bordeaux Court of Appeal, and the municipality was ordered to pay the costs and €3,000 to the owners under article 700 of the Code of Civil Procedure.
The decision rests on two propositions: a loss arising from landlocking is direct when it results from the acquisition itself, and reinvestment does not compensate it. The absence of an undertaking to create an easement and the lack of jurisdiction found by the Court of Appeal were therefore not enough to dismiss the claim. The Court ruled neither on that question of jurisdiction, nor on the amount claimed, nor on how to quantify it.
What this changes for valuation
A direct loss, because it arises from the taking. The taking (emprise) is the part expropriated. The test is the cause: the garage is landlocked by the very acquisition of the plots, including the one onto which it opens. The same year, the Court refused to measure the depreciation of the remainder (dépréciation du surplus) by the extra building cost due to a tunnel sited in an expropriated subsoil, which stems from the public works and not from the taking. The report therefore starts with this question: does the loss come from the transfer of ownership itself, or from what the acquiring authority will do with the land?
Reinvestment covers the property taken, not the property kept. The allowance covers the costs of acquiring a property of the same kind with the principal compensation: transfer duties, conveyancing costs, fees. The garage kept is not replaced; it stays in place, landlocked. The two heads add up, just as, for an operator partly evicted, the partial value of the business (fonds de commerce), the reinvestment allowance and the proven trading loss add up, as the article on the partial eviction of a business explains.
The absence of an easement does not remove the loss. The loss exists precisely because access has not been restored. By a decision of 13 November 2025 (appeal no. 24-11.112), the Court added that indemnities are fixed in euros and that the depreciation of the remainder linked to the loss of access may be repaired in kind, by an easement offered by the acquiring authority, only with the owners’ agreement: that is the subject of the article on the refused easement. The two decisions fit together without contradiction: whether no undertaking to grant an easement was given, as in 2018, or an easement was offered and refused, as in 2025, landlocking is quantified in money. On what becomes of an offered easement, the more recent 2025 decision states the law.
A head linked to the remainder. The claim concerned loss of enjoyment and use of the garage; the Court speaks of a loss lying in the landlocking, without naming it further. It can be presented as a depreciation of the part left outside the taking, and the Court held in 2019 that, in a partial compulsory purchase, such depreciation may be compensated whatever the nature of the property, as the article on partial compulsory purchase in a ZAC, a planned development zone, recalls.
Quantifying the landlocking. The report compares the value of the property kept with the access it had and its value without access, using references from the area: for a garage, sales and rents of comparable garages or parking spaces. As a check, the report quantifies the cost of a substitute access: purchase of a strip of land, a negotiated easement, works. It presents both approaches and explains the one it retains. The €30,000 claimed in this case was not examined by the Court: it is a figure claimed, not a reference.
What the valuer takes from it
- Landlocking of the property kept, caused directly by the acquisition of the plots, is a direct loss under article L. 321-1 of the Expropriation Code.
- The reinvestment allowance covers the costs of acquiring a replacement property; it does not compensate the loss arising from the landlocking of the property kept: the two heads add up.
- The absence of an easement is no bar to compensation; since the decision of 13 November 2025, an offered easement replaces it only with the owner’s agreement.
- The report quantifies the difference in value with and without access, and checks it against the cost of a substitute access.
- The report links each head to its cause and checks that the loss arises from the transfer of ownership itself.
Further reading
The Compulsory purchase and pre-emption page describes the assignment, its timescale and its fee. The guide Compulsory purchase of my business premises: what compensation?, written for the business operator, also covers the valuation dates, the reinvestment allowance and partial takings; the glossary entries dépréciation du surplus, indemnité de remploi and perte de jouissance complement this article. Two other reported 2018 decisions on compensable losses each have their own article: Subsoil compulsory purchase: the tunnel’s extra cost is excluded and Compulsory purchase: occupier under precarious permit compensated. On the same theme: Compulsory purchase: a refused easement still leaves depreciation and Partial eviction of a business: separate trading loss compensated. The decision is available on Légifrance.
What next
Has a compulsory purchase left a garage or land you keep without access?
I quantify what the landlocking costs the property you keep, value with and without access, cost of a substitute access, separately from the principal compensation and the reinvestment allowance. The report serves for the discussion with the acquiring authority or before the expropriation judge.
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