The owners finally have until July 31 to declare the situation of their real estate to the tax authorities, Bercy announced on Friday June 24, “given the influx of declarations” before the initial deadline of June 30.
The declaration obligation has been in place since 1ᵉʳ January to identify the premises exempt from housing tax, abolished for all main residences in 2023. On the tax site, each owner must now indicate, for each of his goods, his situation: if it is empty, in what capacity he occupies it himself, or state the identity of a possible tenant. In total, 34 million taxpayers are concerned.
The declaration of a property is done online on the site Impots.gouv.fr and via the “Manage my real estate (GMBI)” service from your personal or professional space. It had to be carried out before June 30, but, “given the influx of declarations at the end of the period”, it is “possible to carry it out without penalties until July 31, 2023 inclusive”, explains in a press release. presses the Ministry of the Economy.
In a press release published earlier, the Solidaires finances publics union had castigated the “fiasco of the Manage my real estate campaign [qui tourne] a nightmare for the staff of the DGFIP”, the General Directorate of Public Finance.
The union mentioned “a number of physical and telephone contacts never seen at this time of year”, with, in particular, according to him, “more than 94,000 calls on June 16”. Moreover, he regrets the dematerialization of the procedure while taxpayers would be, according to him, more comfortable with paper forms.
Situations “extremely worrying”
Monday, June 19, the general secretary of the Solidaires finances publics union, Anne Guyot Welke, had signed a letter intended for the director general of public finances, Jérôme Fournel, certain passages of which are taken up by The echoes. The trade unionist evokes a “serious and proven psychosocial risk [auquel il est de la] responsibility [de la DGFIP] to remedy”. Indeed, the union is concerned about the feedback from agents in the field who would inform them of “extremely worrying” situations because of sometimes “very aggressive” users.
Another difficulty: the fact that taxpayers do not receive an acknowledgment of receipt after declaring their assets, which would add additional stress for the first concerned who would further solicit the agents already weakened by a difficult context. Our colleagues from Echoes recall that the tax administration operates at a tight flow while the community is struggling to recruit. In addition, the agents are still traumatized by the murder of a controller during a home visit in Pas-de-Calais.
Thursday, June 22, the Director General of Public Finance explained that the response rate from owners was “now beyond 50%”. According to Solidaires, this figure is “less than 60%”. “Like any new declarative obligation, it generates questions, questions”, acknowledged Jérôme Fournel, indicating that “a little less than 20% of the questions asked” at the tax centers were linked to the GMBI campaign.
“We are in the process of completely resetting the database and the operating file to be able to correctly tax second homes and vacant premises versus the exemption for main residences, he explained. The implementation is cumbersome, but, once we have done it, afterwards, it will just be deltas to be updated every year.”
Owners face a fine
What penalties do owners who forget to make their declaration risk? They are liable to a fine corresponding to a lump sum of 150 euros per property which may be applied from January 1, 2024, after reminders. It should be noted that foreign owners of a main or secondary residence or rental accommodation are also concerned by the declaration of real estate.
Will the gesture of the executive make it possible to calm the cacophony? For the Solidaires finances publics union, this one-month period is still too short with a number of tax returns “to be entered still very important”.