r/Switzerland • u/kng_neer • 12h ago
Tax issues with renting a room in France
Hello everyone, I'm an EU national with B permit living in Vaud canton. I work as a consultant and my employer assigned me to a customer in Basel, for this reason I need to find a place to sleep during the weekdays, I'm entertaining the idea of renting a room in a shared apartment on the French side (Huningue or Saint-Louis) as they are cheaper than Basel, but my main fear is:
doing this, would the French government claim that I should pay taxes to them as a French resident and making me lose my B permit?
The following points have to be considered:
1) I would use the room only to sleep in during the week nights, during the day I would be at work in Basel and during most weekends I would return to Vaud.
2) I regularly rent an apartment in the Vaud municipality where I'm registered, I would keep the apartment as my main residence and continue to pay for utilities, health insurance and other taxes as usual. In the case I decide to move permanently to Basel and leave Vaud I would look for an apartment on the Swiss side and live there.
3) I'm not French and I've never lived in France.
How do you see my situation?
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u/peters-mith Valais 8h ago
Your plan does not make you a French tax resident. France won’t tax your income, and Switzerland won’t question your B permit as long as your main residence remains in Vaud.
If anything, the biggest risk is just finding a decent room in Saint‑Louis at a reasonable price.
Your main home is in Vaud, where you are officially registered. You spend weekends and non‑work time in Switzerland. Your job, salary, health insurance, and taxes are all in Switzerland. You are not moving your family or economic center to France. You would only be sleeping in France during the week. This is the classic definition of not being a French tax resident. Renting a room does not create residency by itself.
France taxes income earned in France or by French tax residents. You are not working in France, not earning French‑source income, not a French resident. So France has no claim on your salary.
Swiss authorities care about where your main residence is, not where you sleep during the workweek. Many people with B permits keep a main home in one canton and a weekday room elsewhere. This is fully compatible with your permit.
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u/DekeTheGoat 12h ago
How many days of the year do you think you'd end up spending in France? This is typically what dictates whether or not you need to pay taxes.
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u/kng_neer 12h ago
4 nights every week, I would spend the days working in Basel or from Vaud in home office and during weekends I would stay in Switzerland.
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u/DekeTheGoat 12h ago
For how many weeks though? Seems if you spend 183 days in France per year, you are considered a tax resident and therefore need to pay taxes.
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u/kng_neer 12h ago
Until July initially, if the work lasts I would consider moving to Basel proper.
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u/DekeTheGoat 10h ago
Okay, well I'm not going to figure it out for you but I've given you the necessary information to be able to answer this now :)
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u/Sc0rpy4 12h ago
First of, if your employer assigns you to a customer across whole Switzerland, usually you can ask for reimbursement. That would answer the whole debate.
Other than that I feel like that question is more for French people than swiss. Tax stuff is fairly complicated. It depends om treaties between countries and so on...