Once you have moved: residency cards the basics

This section assumes that the reader has completed a move to France and is no longer a visitor or second-home owner. Here we look at what is needed in the longer term to secure residency. This section does not concern people coming to France on a temporary long-stay visa with a set, non-renewable finish date.

This guide focuses on visa and residency card matters and, as such, is not a general guide to moving to France. If you require general moving information, useful sources include the UK government’s Living in France online guide. Our own help guides to French healthcare, income tax, and inheritance also contain useful information for moving to France long term.

One point to bear in mind is that customs checks should be prepared for in advance, including those for people moving from the UK since Brexit. If moving a large quantity of belongings such as furniture, books, clothes, kitchen white goods, etc., a rough inventory (in duplicate) should be presented to customs along with a completed form. When this is part of a move, there should be no taxes or fees due, which is not the case if moving substantial items over to a French second home.

If a firm is employed to do the removals, they should ideally be international specialists. Several advertise in The Connexion. There are also specific formalities relating to bringing in a car, which must be re-registered in France to get French number plates within a month after moving.

See also the Douanes (customs) service’s website and scroll down for ways to contact them. Pets brought into France should also be registered.

A French decree in force from July 2024 (applying rules from the 2024 immigration law) states that all residency card applicants must sign a ‘contract’ confirming respect for republican values such as gender equality and the secular state. This is not the same as the more complex contrat d’intégration républicaine mentioned later in this chapter.

As of 2025, applicants on the Anef residency cards website are asked to complete this. This process is optional for Brexit WA card applicants, as this card relates to rights that are based on an international treaty and not domestic French law.

In the first months... validation or residency card application 

If you come to France on a VLS-TS visa and intend to stay permanently, you must remember to validate the visa in the first three months. This is completed online by clicking Je valide mon VLS-TS.

The website is headed ‘Foreign nationals in France’ but is also referred to as ‘Anef’ for Administration numérique pour les étrangers en France (digital administration for foreign people in France). It has an option for partial translation to English by clicking the Union Flag symbol.

Enter the visa number in the box. This can be found at the top right of the visa in your passport. Several details from the visa are required, including validity dates and the purpose (motif) that the visa was issued for.

When completing this process a fee is due, eg. €200 for a ‘visitor’ or a spouse of a French person or €50 for a student or stagiaire. The fees are payable with timbres fiscaux obtained from a tabac shop or online.

While you have three months to do this it is preferable to do it as soon as possible. If for any reason you do not or cannot do it in time, you will have to contact the prefecture for the department where you live in France.

Once validated the VLS-TS is considered equivalent to a residency card. It also allows you to apply to join the French social security/healthcare system.

An attestation de validation document will be issued to you once you have completed this step. It will include on it a reference number or numéro d’étranger that you should retain and quote in any correspondence relating to residency issues.

People arriving on visas that require them to apply for a residency permit in the first few months can do so via this same website.

If anything goes wrong with the validation process, such as not receiving any notification of validation (check your personal space on the site and your emails), do not just assume all is fine.

See Contact at the bottom of the homepage for a helpline and online message service. Choose the relevant sections under ‘your request concerns’ and ‘subject’.