Climate forecasts in several French cities pose a risk to homes.
Floods, rising temperatures, clay soil… Will your house lose value due to climatic events in the years to come? Even if the current context of inflation and rising rates is not the most conducive to real estate dynamism, the long-term vision is an issue for many owners, particularly after the last two summers marked by major fires, waves of heat and some torrential rains. A survey carried out by the Risk Weather Tech firm for the magazine Better use of your money has mapped the cities most at risk over the next two decades, among the 50 largest in France.
The firm assessed the six main climate risks in 2050, a horizon defined based on the average holding period for a property in France which is 27 years. Taking into account possible floods, submersions, fires, subsidence, hail episodes and heat waves, a ranking of the cities which should be the most affected has been established. Here are those concerned, with the main estimated risks:
- Aix-en-Provence: fires and heat waves
- Avignon: floods and heat waves
- Bordeaux: floods and heat waves
- Grenoble: floods, subsidence and heat waves
- Lyon: floods and heat waves
- Marseille: fires and heat waves
- Nice: floods, fires and heat waves
- Nîmes: floods, fires and heat waves
- Perpignan: floods, fires and heat waves
- Toulon: floods, fires and heat waves
- Toulouse: floods and heat waves
- Villeurbanne: floods and heat waves
It should be noted that, as in many other similar projections, most of the cities are located in the south of France, on the Mediterranean rim.
This classification does not mean that it is not recommended to buy in these municipalities. “Climate risks should not be the only criterion to base your investment decision, in particular because the State and municipalities are putting in place risk prevention plans aimed at cushioning the effects of the latter,” specifies the magazine . However, this factor must be increasingly taken into account by future owners, even if estimates of property devaluation based on these projections are impossible given the volatility of the market.