French Senate votes to extend rent control by two years: what it means for tenants and how to check your rent

What happened

On Wednesday 21 October 2026 the French Senate approved an extension of encadrement des loyers — the scheme under which, in a number of cities, the base rent may not exceed a set ceiling. According to AFP, 325 senators voted in favour and 17 against.

The vehicle is a bill by MP Iñaki Echaniz, "Retrouver la confiance et l'équilibre dans les rapports locatifs". The National Assembly passed it on 11 December 2025, in a version that made the cap permanent and broader. The Senate amended it: a two-year extension, and only for the communes where the scheme already applies. Housing minister Vincent Jeanbrun, AFP reports, agreed to that version.

Important: this is not law yet. The text goes back to the National Assembly. For the extension to take effect in time, AFP says, Parliament has to adopt it definitively before 24 November. On service-public.gouv.fr, several areas (Plaine Commune, Grenoble, Lille) show the scheme running "until 24 November 2026". For now the rules have not changed — what follows is what applies today.

Where the cap applies

According to service-public (page checked on 1 August 2026), the rent ceiling applies only in some zone tendue communes:

• Île-de-France: Paris; the Est Ensemble area (Bagnolet, Bobigny, Bondy, Le Pré-Saint-Gervais, Les Lilas, Montreuil, Noisy-le-Sec, Pantin, Romainville); the Plaine Commune area (Aubervilliers, La Courneuve, Épinay-sur-Seine, L'Île-Saint-Denis, Pierrefitte-sur-Seine, Saint-Denis, Saint-Ouen-sur-Seine, Stains, Villetaneuse);
• elsewhere: Bordeaux; part of Grenoble-Alpes Métropole; Lille, Hellemmes and Lomme; Lyon and Villeurbanne; Montpellier; the Pays Basque agglomeration.

In most other zone tendue communes a different, milder rule applies: the rent cannot be raised freely when the tenant changes or the lease is renewed. The ceiling itself exists only in the list above.

How the ceiling works

For each type of home (furnished or not, number of rooms, construction period) a loyer de référence and a loyer de référence majoré are published. The base rent — excluding charges and any complément de loyer — may not exceed the loyer de référence majoré in force on the date the lease is signed. The official simulators linked from the service-public page show the figures.

What the lease must state: the base rent; the loyer de référence and loyer de référence majoré for the home's category; the amount of any complément de loyer and the features that justify it. If the home is re-let less than 18 months after the previous tenant left, the rent that tenant paid. The same figures must also appear in the listing.

The complément de loyer trap

A landlord may add a supplement for special features of the home (location, comfort) when the base rent already equals the loyer de référence majoré. For leases signed since 18 August 2022, the supplement is banned if the home has at least one of the listed defects — for example a DPE rating of F or G, or signs of damp.

The supplement can be challenged before the commission départementale de conciliation (CDC) within 3 months of signing the lease; it is up to the landlord to show it is justified. If the dispute is not settled, the tenant has 3 months from the commission's opinion to go to the juge des contentieux de la protection.

If the rent is above the ceiling

• Where the base rent exceeds the loyer de référence majoré, the rules allow the tenant to ask for a reduction and a refund of the overpayment: first the CDC, then, if that fails, the juge des contentieux de la protection.
• In Paris: if the lease does not state the loyer de référence majoré, the tenant has one month from the start of the lease to demand it by registered letter; the landlord has one month to reply. No reply or a refusal — the tenant can go to the judge within 3 months.
• Breaches can be reported: in Paris to the city (Ville de Paris); in Est Ensemble, Plaine Commune, Bordeaux, Grenoble, Lille, Lyon, Montpellier and Pays Basque to the prefecture.
• The landlord faces an administrative fine of up to €5,000 for an individual and up to €15,000 for a company.

What follows from this now

Until the final vote in the National Assembly, the rules stay as they are. Anyone signing a lease in one of the cities above may find it worth checking the base rent against the ceiling in the official simulator before signing, and making sure the mandatory lines are in the lease. The deadlines for challenging are short — for example three months from signing for a complément de loyer — so the lease is best checked straight away rather than six months later.

We will report on the outcome in the National Assembly.