One of the first questions serious American buyers ask me — usually somewhere between the second villa viewing and the first glass of rosé — is deceptively simple: "Whose name should the property actually be in?" For a primary residence back in California, the answer is often a revocable living trust, the workhorse of American estate planning. So it feels natural to assume you can simply hold your Cap d'Antibes or Super Cannes villa the same way. The reality is more nuanced, and the choice you make at the outset can shape your taxes, your succession, and how easily you can pass the property to your children for decades to come.
Having spent years on both sides of the Atlantic — including a stretch based in the Atherton area before returning home to the Riviera — I've watched clients arrive with an American mental model and slowly discover that France plays by a different rulebook. Here is how I frame the two main paths.
The French Instinct: The SCI
The Société Civile Immobilière, or SCI, is the vehicle most French notaires will point you toward. It is a civil (non-commercial) company created specifically to own and manage real estate. Rather than owning the villa directly, you and your family members own shares in a company, and the company owns the villa.
For American buyers, the appeal is real once you understand what it solves.
Why buyers like it
Succession flexibility. France has forced-heirship rules — réserve héréditaire — that reserve a portion of your estate for your children, regardless of what your will says. An SCI doesn't eliminate those rules, but holding property as company shares can make it far easier to organize gradual gifting of shares to children over time, potentially smoothing the transfer and taking advantage of periodic gift allowances.
Avoiding indivision. When several people own a French property directly, they fall into indivision — joint ownership where major decisions can require unanimity. It's a recipe for family gridlock. An SCI replaces that with clear statutes and a managing partner (the gérant), so decisions get made without every relative holding a veto.
Continuity and control. You decide, in the company's statutes, who manages the asset, how shares can be sold, and who has a say. For a multi-generational estate meant to stay in the family, that structure is invaluable.
The trade-offs
An SCI is a real company. It requires proper formation before a notaire, statutes, annual bookkeeping, and sometimes filings that carry modest ongoing costs. Choose the wrong tax election and you can accidentally convert a favorable capital-gains position into something less friendly. And critically, if the SCI is set up to rent the property out on a furnished, commercial basis, it can lose its "civil" character — a technical trap worth avoiding with good advice.
The American Instinct: The US Trust
Now the vehicle you already know. A US revocable living trust is superb for avoiding probate and organizing your estate in the States. The instinct to place your French villa inside it is understandable — one clean structure, one set of documents.
The problem is that France, historically, has not had a native concept of the trust. French law is built around ownership and heirship, not the split between legal and beneficial ownership that a trust creates. That mismatch is where things get complicated.
Where trusts run into friction
Reporting obligations. France imposes specific declaration requirements on trusts that hold French assets or have a French connection. These are administrative, ongoing, and carry meaningful penalties if missed. A trust that runs quietly in the background in the US can become a reporting responsibility in France.
Succession uncertainty. Because French courts don't automatically recognize a trust the way US courts do, the neat succession plan you drafted in America may not translate cleanly. Forced-heirship rules can still assert themselves, and the interaction between your trust and French inheritance law needs careful, specialist review.
Tax characterization. How France treats distributions from, and the very existence of, a foreign trust can be unpredictable and, in some cases, unfavorable. This is precisely the kind of area where a general assumption can cost real money.
So Which One?
For most of my American clients buying a Riviera residence to hold long-term and eventually pass to their children, a French SCI is the more natural fit. It speaks the same legal language as the notaire, the tax authorities, and the succession system it lives inside. It is not exotic here — it is the default, and that predictability is worth a great deal.
That said, a US trust isn't automatically the wrong answer. Some sophisticated buyers combine structures — for instance, holding SCI shares in a way that dovetails with their broader US estate plan — but that is advanced territory, and it only works when a cross-border specialist coordinates both sides so the American and French pieces don't contradict each other.
Questions to bring to your advisors
Before you decide, get clear answers on how each structure affects your impôt sur la fortune immobilière (real-estate wealth tax) exposure, your capital-gains position when you eventually sell, your annual compliance burden in both countries, and — most importantly — how your children will actually inherit. The right structure is the one that still makes sense in twenty years, not just at signing.
A Word of Caution
Everything above is directional, meant to orient you before your professional conversations — not to replace them. Trust and company structuring sits at the intersection of French civil law, French and US tax law, and international succession rules, and the details of your own situation genuinely change the answer. Before you commit to a structure, sit down with a licensed French notaire and a cross-border tax advisor who works fluently in both the US and French systems. I work alongside a trusted network of these professionals every day, and connecting my clients to the right specialist early is one of the most valuable things I do.
The villa is the easy part — it's the beauty of the thing that makes you fall in love. Getting the structure right underneath it is what lets you, and the generation after you, enjoy it without a single regret. That's the work I love most: making sure the dream is built on solid ground.
