Lower notaire fees, to be seen in perspective

The costs paid to the notaire, known as “frais de notaire” (notaire's costs), in fact consist of three quite distinct types of expense:
– taxes and duties;
– administrative disbursements (fees paid to authorities and service providers for the documents that are essential to the legal security of deeds);
– and finally, the notaire's remuneration.

The order of 28 February 2020, which finally came into force on 1 January 2021, provided for an average reduction of 1.9% in the part paid to the notaire as fees (émoluments). Good news… but to be seen in perspective!
Let us take the example of a property sale at 200,000 euros. The total costs were 15,333 euros, including 2,833 euros of notaire's fees.
Thanks to this reduction, the notaire's fees will fall to 2,780 euros and the total costs will therefore amount to 15,280 euros, a reduction of 53 euros.

This should be compared with the 0.7% increase in the departmental tax in 2014, which raised the costs in our example from 13,933 euros before the reform to 15,333 euros, an increase of 1,400 euros.