The cost of the Pinel scheme has exceeded four billion euros in seven years, according to a report from the Court of Auditors

Its cost will reach, according to estimates, 7.3 billion euros in 2023. This cumulative amount of tax exemption will even continue to grow until the end of the budgetary impact of the mechanism in 2038, adds the Court in a report published Thursday.

The cost of the Pinel scheme, intended to support rental investment through tax reductions for buyers in exchange for a cap on rents, exceeded four billion euros between 2014 and 2021. This is what the Court of Auditors points out in a report, published on Thursday, September 5, which franceinfo was able to consult.

Its cost will reach, according to estimates, 7.3 billion euros in 2023. This cumulative amount of tax exemption will even continue to grow until the end of the budgetary impact of the system in 2038, “without the administration being able to present to the Court an exact figure or the parameters enabling it to do so”specifies the Court of Auditors.

In seven years, from 2014 to 2021, there were between 42,500 and 550,000 homes built and renovated solely thanks to the existence of the Pinel system, according to the extremely wide range cited in the report, which regrets that there is no precise evaluation of its impact.

But if its “performance” is difficult to measure precisely, the Pinel system “seems to have had a real volume effect”, judges the Court of Auditors. Although it was very little used for the renovation of real estate, the tax aid mainly concerned the acquisition of housing to be built or under construction. “It has thus largely contributed to the triggering of real estate transactions which could not have been completed, or would have been completed less quickly, without this orientation of individual savings.”

The Court of Auditors notes that the Pinel system has benefited the low-income households that were targeted, households made up of one or two people, and for housing with an average surface area of ​​57 m2, located mainly in high-demand areas.

“Without quantified objectives or precise and reliable data, it is difficult to evaluate the consequences of the Pinel system on the construction or renovation of housing,” However, the report stresses that it is not possible, according to the Court of Auditors, “to assess the share of housing that would not have been built without tax benefits.”

In 2023, the Minister of the Economy Bruno Le Maire considered the Pinel system to be ineffective and too costly for public finances. A plan to respond to the housing crisis was presented by the government last year. Among the main measures of this plan is the extinction, on December 31, 2024, of the Pinel system. The Court of Auditors’ report does not comment on this choice, but regrets that this announcement was not accompanied by specific measures on the alternatives considered.