Change of use permits (change of destination) · legal short-term rental · Version française
We convert your offices or commercial premises into hotel-style serviced accommodation: the planning destination that allows short-term rental all year round — no night cap, no quota, none of the housing-code restrictions (and up to full hotel use if you wish). Hundreds of permits filed across France — and you pay only if the permit is granted.
Hundreds
of permit applications completed across France
120+
Paris cases documented in our precedent database
40+
apartments & suites we operate ourselves
€0
if the permit is not granted — a genuine full success fee
By the operators of Lavie Maison
Agence BnB is run by the team behind Lavie Maison, one of Europe's leading short-term rental and hospitality operators. Hundreds of permit applications across France, approvals obtained even in Paris's protected heritage districts, a unique precedent database, partner architects and fire-safety specialists — an operator's expertise, working for your property.
About the agency →Vacant offices or a street-level shop in a tourist district, run as hotel-style serviced accommodation, generate income on a different scale from a standard lease — and the value of the walls follows.
But between the two stands the planning permit: the exact sub-destination to target, the local zoning plan (PLU) and its zone-by-zone rules, the permit track (prior declaration or building permit), the opinion of the Architecte des Bâtiments de France in protected areas, the documents to produce, the site notice and the appeal period. An approximate file ends in a refusal — or months lost.
Our job: securing that passage. Yours: deciding what to do with the value created — operate, lease to an operator, or resell with the permit.
Track record
Commercial premises, office floors, regularisations — four representative cases, with permit track, timelines and outcome.
See the case studies →Observatory
We compiled the change of use permits granted for hotel-style serviced accommodation across all of France. Search your street.
Explore the observatory →01
Free — 48 h
Zoning, applicable rules, permit track, constraints (heritage, co-ownership, ERP). A straight answer: viable or not — and under which track.
02
We produce everything
CERFA forms, plans, statements, visual insertion, heritage section: a complete file calibrated to what the planning officer expects, to avoid the document request that resets the clock.
03
Online portal or counter
Filing, active follow-up, responses to the planning department and to the Architecte des Bâtiments de France where relevant, through to the decision.
04
The only payment trigger
Decision or tacit non-opposition: we guide you through the site notice and the clearing of the third-party appeal period. That is when — and only when — our fee is due.
Every document we produce is public: see the technical file → · the full journey, step by step: the 5-step process →
Example: a 400 m² office floor = €40,000 excl. VAT, due only upon approval. A 20 m² unit = €2,500 excl. VAT. Full pricing details →
Why a success fee?
Because we are operators before we are consultants: a property owner has no use for a “file submitted” — only the permit creates value. Paying us on results means we only take on the cases we believe we can win, and we fight through to the decision.
Test my property's feasibilityOur other businesses — Paris Airbnb
An operating furnished tourist rental, a convertible commercial unit, an income building: off-market sourcing, returns analysed by an operator, turnkey management available. Agency fee 4% excl. VAT, success-based.
Invest in Airbnb →A furnished tourist apartment, guest accommodation, a seasonal rental property or an entire building: yield-based valuation, professional buyers, a discreet sale — success fee only.
Sell my Airbnb →Paris first — where we run our own buildings — plus the major French tourist cities where conversion makes the most sense.
Je pensais mon local commercial coincé en bail précaire. En le passant en hébergement hôtelier, il rapporte aujourd'hui trois fois plus — et je n'ai payé qu'à l'obtention.
Deux cabinets m'avaient dit non. Eux ont regardé le dossier en exploitants, l'ont présenté autrement, et l'autorisation est passée. La différence, c'est qu'ils montent ces dossiers pour leurs propres immeubles.
J'avais un courrier de la mairie et je paniquais. Ils ont régularisé mon bien en hébergement hôtelier : plus de limite de nuitées, plus de stress. J'aurais dû les appeler avant.
Vendre au prix du rendement plutôt qu'au m² nu a changé le résultat du tout au tout. Vente discrète, acquéreur pro, dossier carré : rien à redire.
Retours représentatifs de nos clients, anonymisés pour préserver leur confidentialité.
A change of use with no works affecting the load-bearing structure or the façade only requires a simplified filing, the prior declaration (déclaration préalable). As soon as the project alters the façade or the structure, a full building permit is required. We qualify the right track at the feasibility-study stage — that is often where the whole case is won or lost.
Expect roughly 1 month of review for a prior declaration (often extended to 2 months in protected heritage areas, where France's heritage architect — the Architecte des Bâtiments de France — gives an opinion) and 3 months for a building permit, once a complete file is submitted. We prepare the file so the planning department has no grounds to request additional documents, which would reset the clock.
You pay nothing: our fee is due only when the permit is granted (including by tacit non-opposition). That is also why we only take on a case after a serious feasibility study.
Converting offices or a shop into hotel-style serviced accommodation removes no housing from the market: you therefore stay clear of the separate housing-code regime (changement d'usage) and its compensation requirements, which make converting residential units nearly impossible in major cities. It is the most direct route to creating hotel capacity.
You need to check that the building's co-ownership rules (règlement de copropriété) do not prohibit the activity and, in some cases, obtain approval from the general meeting of co-owners. We analyse this at the feasibility stage, so the issue never surfaces after filing.
Hotel-style serviced accommodation generally qualifies as a public-access building (ERP): depending on capacity and layout, the project must then address fire safety and disabled access. We scope these points in the study and the file, bringing in the relevant specialists when the project requires it.
That is home turf for us: we have obtained permits in the heart of Paris's protected heritage districts for our own buildings. These files call for a specific presentation — they are won through preparation.
No — we are a hotel operator. We build these files first and foremost for our own acquisitions, with partner architects when needed. You get an operator's expertise, not a flat-fee service: if your application fails, we earn nothing.
Going further: the complete guide to converting a property into a hotel →
Describe your property: we reply within 48 working hours with a straight answer — feasible or not, under which track, in what timeframe and at what fee.