A company buys in 2008, from a grouping of municipalities, two plots the grouping held from the department. Six years later it discovers they belonged to the departmental public domain: inalienable, therefore unsellable. The department declassifies the plots in 2014 and regularises the sale of a third plot, but not of the first two. The 2008 sale is annulled. What remained was what the buyer gets back: the Court of Appeal refuses to refund the property tax, on the ground that the buyer can ask the tax office for relief. On 7 May 2026 the Cour de cassation (the French supreme court for civil matters) quashed that ruling: property tax paid by the buyer of a property whose sale is annulled is a compensable loss. The decision sheds light on two points a valuer often meets, the public-domain status of land and the quantification of the consequences of annulment.
The facts
By notarial deed of 4 and 6 March 2003 a company buys a plot from the Manche department, then, by deed of 18 December 2008, two other plots from a grouping of municipalities, which had itself bought them from the department in 2004. In early 2014 the buyer learns that all three plots belonged to the departmental public domain. On 16 May 2014 they are declassified, and the department and the buyer sign a new deed of transfer for the first plot on 7 August 2014. Nothing is regularised for the other two; the buyer sues the grouping and the notary for annulment of the 2008 sale and damages.
The Caen Court of Appeal, on 30 January 2024, annuls the 2008 sale and rejects the claim for refund of the property taxes, the buyer being able to apply to the tax administration for relief.
The decision
The third civil chamber (Cass. 3e civ., 7 May 2026, nos. 24-13.491 and 24-15.282) first approved the annulment. It recalled article L. 3111-1 of the General Code on the Property of Public Bodies: public domain property “is inalienable and imprescriptible”, hence “a prohibition on disposing of property belonging to that domain, voluntarily or not, for value or free of charge”, and “the sale of a public domain property may take place only after a decision of declassification”. The retroactive declassification allowed by the ordinance of 19 April 2017 does not apply to a declassification decision taken in 2014. And the Court of Appeal, having noted that no regularisation by notarial deed had occurred for the disputed plots whereas the first plot had been the subject of a new deed, could infer that the parties had not agreed to repeat the sale, and that it was void.
On the property taxes, it quashed under article 1382, now 1240, of the Civil Code: “the author of a harm must repair all its consequences”. By sending the buyer to seek tax relief, “whereas the payment of property tax paid by the buyer of a property whose sale has been annulled constitutes a compensable loss, the Court of Appeal breached the above provision”. Remittal to the Rennes Court of Appeal on that point, costs against the notary.
What this changes for valuation
Public domain land is not sold; it is declassified first. Roads, dependencies of departmental roads, land assigned to a public service: as long as a property is assigned and no declassification decision has been taken, its sale is void with absolute nullity, and a later declassification saves it only if the parties repeat their agreement, in practice by a new deed. For the valuer instructed to value, the question of public-domain status arises whenever the seller is a public body or the land adjoins a road: the root of title, the past assignment and the declassification decision go into the report, because land that cannot be sold has no market value within the meaning of the French valuation charter (Charte de l’expertise en évaluation immobilière, 6th edition, November 2025, Title III, § 1.1), which presupposes a possible transaction.
Annulment, and afterwards. Nullity puts the parties back in their prior position: the property returns to the seller, the price to the buyer. But the buyer has meanwhile paid property taxes, deed fees, sometimes works, and may have given up other operations. The decision says that property tax is a loss to be repaired by the party responsible, here the selling authority and the notary according to fault, without sending the buyer to an uncertain tax procedure. The same reasoning applies to other expenses incurred for nothing.
What is quantified. In an annulment the valuer’s report presents restitutions and losses in two separate columns. Restitutions: the price, and for the property, its value at the date of return if improvements or deterioration have occurred, with the corresponding indemnity. Losses: property taxes and deed fees, useful expenses retained by the seller, the cost of the steps taken, and the lost chance of carrying out the intended operation, measured by the gap between what the land would have yielded and what was obtained, weighted by a probability. Each item has its document: tax notices, invoices, project.
Partial regularisation and consistency of values. Here one plot was bought back in 2014 after declassification, the other two were not. The 2014 deed provides a useful price reference for valuing the neighbouring plots at the same date; it also shows what the authority was prepared to do for one and not for the others, which weighs in the assessment of fault.
Checking before buying. A professional buyer purchasing from a public body has the declassification resolution and the record of de-assignment checked. A preliminary valuation, when requested, flags the absence of those documents as a blocking reservation, before any figure.
What the valuer takes from it
- Public domain property is inalienable; its sale without prior declassification is void, and a later declassification regularises it only with a fresh agreement of the parties.
- Property tax paid by the buyer of an annulled sale is a compensable loss, with no referral to tax relief.
- Quantifying an annulment separates restitutions, price and property, from losses, taxes, fees, useful expenses, lost chance.
- A partial regularisation gives a price reference and a clue to the respective faults.
- Facing a public seller, the declassification resolution and the de-assignment are checked before any valuation.
Further reading
The Market value page describes the assignment, its timescale and its fee. The guide I paid too much, can I challenge the price and the glossary entry valeur vénale complement this article. On the same theme: Commercial lease on public land: void, but occupation is paid for and Concealed foundation works: sale annulled, buyer owes the value of use. The decision is available on Légifrance.
What next
A sale annulled, with years of taxes, works and fees to recover?
I quantify the restitutions and losses of an annulled sale: value of the property to be returned, useful expenses, taxes, fees and lost chance, with the documents that support them.
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