A trader occupies premises under successive short-term leases (baux dérogatoires, leases outside the French commercial lease statute), then claims the statutory regime of commercial leases (statut des baux commerciaux); the landlord then wants the rent of the resulting commercial lease set. Do the two years to act run from the birth of that lease or from the claim to the statute? By a reported decision of 7 July 2016, the Third Civil Chamber of the Cour de cassation (the French supreme court for civil and commercial matters) retains the date of the claim, from which the rent is also set at rental value. For the valuer, it is the valuation date.
The facts
The owners of a shop in Paris granted a company several successive short-term leases between 1 July 2006 and 1 August 2010. By registered letter of 8 September 2010, the tenant claimed the benefit of the statutory regime of commercial leases. The owners sued it on 21 January 2011 to have the amount of the rent set.
Article L. 145-5 of the Commercial Code allows the parties to depart from the statute for a limited total duration, two years at the time of the facts, three years since Law no. 2014-626 of 18 June 2014; beyond that, if the tenant stays and is left in possession, or if a new lease is concluded between the same parties for the same premises, a new lease subject to the statute arises (bail commercial, the French commercial lease). The lease at issue is the one “which took effect on 2 August 2008”, in the words of the decision.
On 1 April 2015, the Paris Court of Appeal declared the action time-barred, running the two years from the birth of the commercial lease; it also held that the expert appraisal ordered by the first-instance judge could not look for the elements needed to determine the rent of that lease, in its view the rent applicable at its effective date.
The owners appealed: since the statute contains no provision on the initial rent of a commercial lease, their action would, in their view, fall under the general law of leases, not under the two-year limitation period of article L. 145-60 of the Commercial Code.
The decision
The Cour de cassation partially quashed the judgment (Cass. 3e civ., 7 July 2016, appeal no. 15-19.485, reported), in two steps.
It first rejected the ground of appeal: “the action to set the rent of the commercial lease that arises by application of article L. 145-5 of the Commercial Code is subject to the two-year limitation period of article L. 145-60 of the Commercial Code” (translated from the French, as are all quotations in this article).
Then, on a ground raised of its own motion, under article L. 145-60 of the Commercial Code and article 2224 of the Civil Code, which makes limitation run “from the day on which the holder of a right knew or ought to have known the facts enabling them to exercise it”, it observed that the claim to set the rent of such a lease “presupposes that application of the statutory regime of commercial leases has been requested by one or other of the parties”. It concluded that “the limitation period for the action to set the rent of such a lease runs, not from the date on which the commercial lease comes into being, but from the date on which the request for application of the statutory regime is made by one or other of the parties, the amount of the rent being set at rental value from the day of that request”.
Since the tenant claimed the commercial lease on 8 September 2010, the action brought on 21 January 2011, “that is, less than two years after that date”, was not time-barred: the Court of Appeal “breached the texts referred to above”. The quashing also covers the limitation placed on the expert appraisal, and the case was remitted to the Paris Court of Appeal differently composed. The decision sets no amount and does not rule on the rent due before the claim to the statute.
What this changes for valuation
The valuation date is the date of the claim to the statute. Since the rent is set at rental value from the day of the request, the valuer assesses that value at 8 September 2010, not at 2 August 2008: in a little over two years, neighbourhood rents and the trading quality of the street may have moved. Comparables, leases signed and rents set, are chosen around that date (Charte de l’expertise en évaluation immobilière, the French property valuation charter, 6th edition, November 2025, Title III, ch. 2), as the glossary entry date de valeur (valuation date) recalls.
The request may come from either party. A tenant claiming the statute, as here, or a landlord seeking its application: the report identifies the document carrying the request, its date and its author, and attaches it. That same document starts the two years running and dates the valuation.
A rental value, with no reference to a cap. The Court states that the rent is set “at rental value” and mentions no cap. The decision does not refer to article L. 145-33 of the Commercial Code, which was written for leases being renewed or reviewed; the valuer borrows its criteria, through which the statute defines rental value: characteristics of the premises, permitted use, the parties’ respective obligations, local commercial factors, rents commonly charged in the neighbourhood. The rent paid under the short-term leases is one piece of evidence, compared with the market, not its measure. The guaranteed minimum of a turnover rent follows a different rule: the judge sets the minimum if the lease so provides.
The period before the request. The decision does not settle it: the report therefore states the date and the period it values; if the date is disputed, a private valuation can quantify the rental value at each disputed date, pointing out the one the Cour de cassation retains.
The same period, other starting points. The two-year period of article L. 145-60 governs other actions under the statute, each with its own starting point: the claim for eviction compensation (indemnité d’éviction), from the effective date of a notice refusing renewal; the withdrawal of a renewal offer for serious cause, from the landlord’s discovery of the breach; the action for nullity of a sale made in breach of the tenant’s right of first refusal.
What the valuer takes from it
- For a commercial lease born of successive short-term leases, the action to set the rent falls under the statute’s two-year limitation period (article L. 145-60 of the Commercial Code).
- The period runs from the request for application of the statute, made by either party, not from the birth of the commercial lease.
- The rent is set at rental value from that request: it is the valuation date of the report, and comparables are chosen around it.
- The report produces the document carrying the claim to the statute, takes its date from it and states the period valued; the decision does not settle the earlier rent.
Further reading
The Commercial rent and leases page describes the assignment, its timescale and its fee. The guide Lease renewal in France: my landlord wants to uncap the rent and the glossary entries bail commercial, valeur locative and date de valeur complement this article. The neighbouring point: Turnover rent: the judge sets the minimum if the lease says so. On the same theme: Commercial rent uncapping in France: four ways out of the cap and Commercial lease: twelve years and one day, the rent is uncapped. The decision is available on Légifrance.
What next
Short-term leases turned into a commercial lease, and a rent to be set?
I establish the rental value of the premises at the date of the request for application of the statutory regime, the date the Cour de cassation retains, with rent comparables close to that date. The report gives the landlord, the tenant or the judge a demonstrated rent for the lease born of the short-term leases.
Free quote, by email or by phone. No commitment before the quote is accepted. Fees are never linked to the value of the property (Charte de l’expertise, Title I, §2.1).
