Insee Focus · October 2026 · n° 388

Housing Stock on 1 January 2026 7.6% of Vacant Housing Units, the Decline Continued

On 1 January 2026, in France excluding Mayotte, the housing stock amounted to 38.6 million housing units. 82.7% of dwellings were main residences and 54.4% were one‑family dwellings. Since 2010, the growth of housing stock slowed down: the number of housing units rose on average by 0.8% per year since 2016, compared to +1.2% per year between 2000 and 2009 and +1.1% between 2010 and 2015.

After increasing sharply between 2005 and 2019, the proportion of vacant dwellings fell, from 8.1% in 2019 to 7.6% in 2026; the latter share corresponded to 2.9 million vacant housing units. In addition, 3.8 million dwellings were second homes and occasional dwellings; after increasing between 2011 and 2017, their proportion remained stable since then.

57.3% of households owned their main residences, a proportion that increased between 1997 and 2013 and remained almost stable from 2014 onwards. Since 2020, the share of homeowner households paying mortgage or loan fell from 21.4% to 19.8% in 2026. The share of housing units rented from public landlords decreased slightly since 1997, from 18.7% to 17.3% in 2026.