It’s neither as easy nor as peasy as simply using the rate in the much maligned Connexion, which is what I do every year.
That’s only an option, it’s not obligatory.
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The core of your comment is correct but also misleading.
It is a UK based activity for which you are ultimately declaring your net income after actual expenses. This is not unlike how the régime du réel works but to say so isn’t correct.
The calculation is simple. Presuming your property portfolio is privately owned ie. Not a registered UK company then all your calculations of income and expenditure are done in sterling and then the exchange rate is applied to your net income figure regardless whether you have transferred part of the income to another currency during the relevant tax year.
You may or may not employ an agent to manage your portfolio but in my case I do. My agents fee is tax deductible and makes life very easy as they have a database of local tradespeople to react quickly to any problems.
As a life long builder when first arriving in France 16 years ago I found it difficult to let go and let my agent manage repairs but as time has past the tradesman I used have moved on, retired or died my agent can easily turn to new tradespeople who I wouldn’t know existed.
There is no need to itemise when a plumber fixed the loo but keep such records in case your total repair costs are challenged at a later date.
The best bit of having a good agent is that mine produces a year end statement for both the French tax year and the UK tax year covering all income and expenditure and they archive all the individual invoices and bank transactions should they be needed at a future date.
My agents fee is worth every penny.
@JohnBoy as a matter of interest what percentage is your agents fee for that full management service as it sounds like you have a real gem there, certainly compared to mine!
It depends on what you want your agent to do.
Mine provides a full management service for which they charge a 9% fee. I think for one property the fee would be 10% upwards but having more I negotiated a lower fee. I have used the same agent for 16 years and as you say, they are a gem. I am sure there are others.
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JohnBoy
I DO use an agent (they’re fantastic - honest and reliable and excellent value at 7% plus VAT for a full management service) but since I declare in France under the régime du réel I am required to itemize the expenditure (détail de la ligne 224 Dépenses de réparation, d’entretien et d’amélioration) in Form 2044.
I don’t have any choice in the matter. Unless you’re suggesting I ignore the “détail” prompt.
And yes, I deduct my agent’s management fee (they’re part of the total figure for frais d’administration entered in Line 221 of Form 2044).
Anyone else out there who’s ignored the “détail”
prompt for Line 224 of Form 2044? With no adverse consequences?!
It would certainly save me a lot of hassle…
I’ve also completed the detailed breakdown based on what I also understood to be the requirement over the value threshold. I have a running breakdown on a spreadsheet based on monthly statements I get from my agent, so don’t have the luxury of @JohnBoy annual statements for UK and France, but it’s ok for me………… so far.
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I couldn’t say if the ‘detail’ prompt is ignored as like employing an agent in the UK I also employ an accountant in France for my tax affairs which undoubtedly saves me a lot of hassle. For what I consider to be a modest fee allows me to not worry knowing that they will deal with everything. During the last 16 years they have challenged a number of issues on my behalf, all of which have been concluded satisfactorily.
We all do things differently.
Thank you letsmile. So I’m not alone.
“Not a registered UK company then all your calculations of income and expenditure are done in sterling and then the exchange rate is applied to your net income figure regardless whether you have transferred part of the income to another currency during the relevant tax year.”
Not following you. Of course all my calculations of income & expenditure are done in sterling and then the exchange rate is applied to my net income figure regardless of whether I have transferred part of the income to another currency during the relevant tax year.
I still have to declare more than just the net income figure in Form 2044, though.
There are various lines for different categories of expenditure (quite apart from the requirement to itemize expenditure on repairs): Primes d’assurance (line 223), Taxes foncières (line 227). It’s not simply a matter of indicating the net income in €.
Are we looking at the same form?!!
OK. So you don’t actually complete Form 2044.
Not personally but my accountant might 
So how do you know «there is no need to itemise when a plumber fixed the loo but keep such records in case your total repair costs are challenged at a later date »?
Maybe your accountant itemizes the expenditure for you.
Seems to me that anyone with a “complicated” Declaration to make… might just as well talk the situation through at their local Impots office. Find out where (if anywhere) one can shorten an otherwise over-lengthy blah blah blah…
In the past, I’ve found a personal approach to be very useful/helpful.
Good idea.
DIY tax submission is not something I subscribe to, at least not French ones. On-line tax returns in the UK is a different matter, or at least it is now. Years ago I had a UK accountant do it for me but now with just property income to declare it is simple.
I quite enjoy doing the French return in a sadomasochistic sort of way. But if I’m still
here when I’m old I’ll hand it over to an accountant.
I always email my tax office and they send me the rate they will accept. Simple.
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I’ve actually found the on-line declaration here to be considerably easier than in the UK and the on-line help is really useful. The tax office helped me fill in my first declaration and after that I’ve done it myself. I don’t have rental income which probably makes my returns easier than some but I do have a lot of little bits of income from diverse places, which I keep on a spreadsheet. That is quite complicated enough without having to do on-the-day currency conversions for every single item using the Banque de France daily rates. The tax office suggested I used their December minus previous December “average” rate so I go with that for everything apart from the State Pension which is paid directly in euros.
As the daughter of a tax inspector, I’ve always been meticulously honest in my returns 
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Impots insist that you apply the exchange rate on the actual day all transactions occur, not an average for the year, so the connexion rate is technically incorrect
And yet my tax office accepts it so happy days.