Can you settle a caravan or a mobile home in your garden?

Verified 19 April 2024 - Directorate for Legal and Administrative Information (Prime Minister)

Would you like to settle a caravan or mobile home in your garden? We are taking stock of the regulations in force and the possible steps to be taken.

The caravan is a habitable land vehicle intended for temporary or seasonal occupation for recreational use. It keeps its wheels and its traction bar permanently. It is registered and traffic is permitted under the highway code.

The mobile home is a habitable land vehicle intended for temporary or seasonal occupation for recreational use. It keeps its wheels and its traction bar. Carte grise It must have a train in order to be towed, but the highway code prohibits its circulation.

Caravan

The procedure to be done depends on installation time of your caravan:

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Less than 3 months per year

You can settle a caravan in your garden less than 3 months a year without city planning authorization. You must not use it as a dwelling or as an annex to your dwelling.

Please note

All periods of parking, consecutive or not, are taken into account for the calculation of the 3 months.

Local city planning rules (MORE: titleContent or municipal card) may impose special restrictions. To find out, you must contact the city planning department of your city hall.

Who shall I contact

More than 3 months per year

You must file a Advance Work Statement (AD) to the town hall.

  • By dematerialized according to the arrangements made by your municipality (inquire on the site of the town hall or on the spot)
  • By letter RAR: titleContent
  • In your own hand
Who shall I contact
In Paris

You must submit your file to the BASU: titleContent by dematerialized means only:

Office Accueil et Service à l'Usager (BASU) de Paris: one-stop-shop

Warning  

If you settle on your land a caravan from which you have removed the means of mobility (wheels, traction bar), you must drop a preliminary declaration of works with your town hall as if for a construction.

Mobile home

The regulations that apply are different depending on whether you keep or that you remove the wheels and the traction bar of your mobile home.

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Recreational mobile home (with means of transport)

He is forbidden to settle a mobile home for leisure in his garden.

The mobile home is allowed on the following adapted reception areas:

  • Specially equipped residential leisure park
  • Holiday village classified as accommodation
  • Campsite

Mobile home that has lost its mobility

A mobile home from which the means of mobility have been removed is considered as a construction. You can ask the city planning department of your municipality if it is possible to install it.

Depending on its surface area, you will have to file a building permit or a prior declaration of works with the City Hall.

Up to 20 m²

If the floor area or footprint of the mobile home is less than or equal to 20 m², you must deposit in town hall a Advance Work Statement (AD) :

  • By dematerialized according to the arrangements made by your municipality (inquire on the site of the town hall or on the spot)
  • By letter RAR: titleContent
  • In your own hand
Who shall I contact
General case
Form

You must submit your RFP to the City Hall using the following form:

Prior declaration for a detached house and/or its annexes - DPMI

In Paris

You must submit your file to the BASU: titleContent by dematerialized means only:

Office Accueil et Service à l'Usager (BASU) de Paris: one-stop-shop

More than 20 m²

If the mobile home is more than 20 m² floor or footprint area, you must file in town hall a building permit :

  • By dematerialized according to the arrangements made by your municipality (inquire on the site of the town hall or on the spot)
  • By letter RAR: titleContent
  • In your own hand
Who shall I contact
In Paris

You must submit your file to the BASU: titleContent by dematerialized means only:

Office Accueil et Service à l'Usager (BASU) de Paris: one-stop-shop

Support for your city planning authorization request

Who can help me?

Find who can answer your questions in your region

  • For more general information

    Telephone administrative information - Allo Public Service

    For more information on this topic, you can contact Allô Service Public.

    Cost: free service

    The informants who answer you belong to the ministry in charge of housing and city planning.

    Attention: the service does not have access to users' personal files and cannot therefore provide information on their status.

    The service is available at the following times:

      • Lundi : de 08h30 à 16h15
      • Mardi : de 08h30 à 12h15
      • Mercredi : de 08h30 à 12h15
      • Jeudi : de 08h30 à 17h30
      • Vendredi : de 13h00 à 16h15

    Request a call

  • For more information on a case

    Town Hall

  • For more information on a file filed in Paris

    Paris: Reception and service desk (BASU)