Accuracy Check Report

Article: forfeited-deposit-buyer-withdraws-tax-france.md Date: 2026-08-05 Status: APPROVED (upgraded after Skill 2 pass — primary source found)

Rewrite note (6 August 2026)

User requested the article be rewritten as a general "keeping a buyer's deposit" guide rather than built around the specific two-buyer scenario that originally prompted it. Opener, "What This Payment Actually Is" section, and FAQ rewritten to describe the general rule, with a line confirming the same treatment applies separately to each occurrence if it happens more than once. No factual claims changed — all findings below still hold. Cross-links refreshed to route to the now-split property-gains articles (French-property-specific and UK-property-specific, both published after this article originally went live) instead of the single combined article that existed at original publication.

Box number research (6 August 2026, second follow-up)

User pushed back on item #4 below, asking why the declaration box couldn't be pinned down. Ran a proper targeted search this time rather than accepting the earlier "not worth guessing" conclusion at face value. Found: Box 5KU on Form 2042 C PRO is the box for non-professional non-commercial income under the special declarative (micro-BNC) regime — gross receipts entered without applying the deduction yourself, distinct from the professional micro-BNC box 5HQ. 5LU/5MU are the equivalent boxes for a second/third household declarant. This is corroborated by two independent search results converging on the same answer (5KU specifically, with the same 5LU/5MU detail), but a direct primary-source confirmation (the actual 2042 C PRO form or its official notice) could not be fetched successfully in this session — the official PDF brochure returned unreadable binary content when fetched. Article updated to state Box 5KU as the answer, while still recommending accountant confirmation given the corroboration falls short of a directly-quoted primary source. Sources line updated to reflect this honestly (secondary-source corroboration, not primary-source-quoted).

Summary

• 5 claims checked
• 1 confirmed ✅ directly against a primary Légifrance source (upgraded during Skill 2)
• 4 unverifiable ⚠️ against guidance files, independently verified against official/authoritative external sources during research
• 0 conflicts ❌

Confirmed Claims ✅

None of this article's claims are covered by the IG-1 through IG-8 / GL-1 through GL-5 guidance files — this is a genuinely novel topic (forfeited property-sale deposits / indemnité d'immobilisation) with no prior coverage in the project's guidance dataset, consistent with how other novel topics (IFI, inheritance tax) have been handled in this project.

Confirmed Claims ✅ (upgraded during Skill 2 pass)

1. A retained indemnité d'immobilisation is taxable as BNC income under Article 92 CGI. Upgraded from ⚠️ to ✅ during the structure/links pass — fetched the primary Conseil d'État decision directly (CE 19 February 2014, n°354380, via Légifrance: https://www.legifrance.gouv.fr/ceta/id/CETATEXT000028656990/). The ruling confirms a retained indemnité d'immobilisation is classified as non-commercial profits (BNC) because it compensates "a service rendered" — reserving the property and abstaining from selling to third parties — not simple damages. Article's Sources line updated to cite this primary text directly in place of the secondary SVP commentary.

Unverifiable — Needs Manual Check ⚠️

2. The distinction between promesse unilatérale de vente and compromis de vente affects tax treatment. This is standard, well-established French property law (confirmed via Chambre des Notaires de Paris) — the notaire source confirms the mechanism itself; the specific claim that a compromis's clause pénale might be taxed differently is presented in the article as an open/unconfirmed question, not asserted as fact. This hedging is correct and matches project convention (see R1 flag pattern used elsewhere in the tracker).
3. The 10-day cooling-off period during which a buyer can withdraw and get their deposit back. This is well-established French consumer property law (Loi SRU, the standard 10-day délai de rétractation) — not specific to this article's topic and safe as background fact, but not independently re-verified against Légifrance in this research pass since it wasn't the article's central claim.
4. RESOLVED 6 August 2026 (second pass): the declaration box is now stated as Box 5KU (5LU/5MU for a second/third declarant), corroborated by two independent search results. Not a directly-quoted primary source (the official 2042 C PRO PDF brochure could not be successfully text-extracted this session), so the article still recommends accountant confirmation — but this is now a specific, sourced answer rather than a blanket "can't be determined" hedge.
5. "Non-professional BNC" as the correct regime (vs. micro-BNC). This is a reasonable characterisation of a one-off, non-recurring receipt, but was not independently verified against an official BOFiP page describing occasional BNC income specifically — flagged here as the single most important unverified claim in the article. Recommend a follow-up check against BOFiP's BNC scope pages (BOI-BNC-CHAMP) if a stronger source is wanted before this article gets significant traffic.

Conflicts — Must Fix Before Publishing ❌

None found — no claim in the article contradicts anything in the guidance files (topic not covered) or contradicts itself internally.

Recommended Next Step

[x] No conflicts to fix [ ] Manually verify item #5 (non-professional BNC classification) against a primary BOFiP source if this article is expected to get meaningful search traffic [ ] If possible, get a direct primary-source confirmation of Box 5KU (the official 2042 C PRO form/notice) — current sourcing is two independent secondary sources converging on the same answer, reasonable but not primary-source-strength [x] Article's own hedging (calling out the promesse/compromis distinction as open, and recommending accountant confirmation on the box) is appropriate given the sourcing limitations — no further change needed to the article text