Looking for a forest for sale in France to grow timber, to shoot over, to hand down to your children or simply to own your own trees? This section brings together every listing in the forestry category of ma-propriete.fr: commercial forests, forest estates with buildings, wooded blocks of several hundred hectares, as well as woodland for sale in France in plots of a few hectares and properties combining trees, water and hunting ground. They come from private owners, estate agents and notaires (the public officers who handle every French property sale) across the whole country, and each one is filed under the sub-section that fits it.
A forest is not bought like a house. Its value depends on the soil, the tree species, the age of the stands and the volume of standing timber, but also on access, on the hunting and on the rules that govern how it is managed. This page first gives you the prices actually paid at sale, for France as a whole and region by region. It then explains the main types of forest property, the country’s forest regions and the steps of a purchase, from the neighbours’ right of first refusal to the compulsory management plan.
Our forest price observatory analyses every sale of forests of 1 ha or more recorded in the French DVF land registry database since July 2020. In 2025, the median price of a hectare of forest in France was €4,936/ha, up 1.9% over the year, with an average of €6,214/ha, across 6,329 sales. Over the whole period, 35,100 sales covered 302,720 ha at a median of €4,778/ha: the market is rising slowly and steadily.
| Year | Number of sales | Median price | Change |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2021 | 6,521 | €4,624/ha | — |
| 2022 | 6,473 | €4,825/ha | +4.3% |
| 2023 | 6,569 | €4,854/ha | +0.6% |
| 2024 | 6,424 | €4,846/ha | −0.2% |
| 2025 | 6,329 | €4,936/ha | +1.9% |
Regional differences are considerable: in 2025, a hectare sells for two to three times as much in Normandy and Hauts-de-France as in Occitanie or Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes. Soil and stand quality, development pressure around towns and the share of small leisure plots explain most of these differences.
| Region (2025) | Sales | Median price | One-year change |
|---|---|---|---|
| Normandy | 298 | €10,000/ha | +4.7% |
| Hauts-de-France | 384 | €8,787/ha | +6.9% |
| Île-de-France | 106 | €6,216/ha | +2.3% |
| Centre-Val de Loire | 342 | €5,803/ha | −3.3% |
| Grand Est | 527 | €5,498/ha | +10.9% |
| Brittany | 222 | €5,208/ha | +11.8% |
| Pays de la Loire | 254 | €5,000/ha | −5.3% |
| Provence-Alpes-Côte d’Azur | 346 | €4,854/ha | −15.9% |
| Bourgogne-Franche-Comté | 650 | €4,715/ha | −3.0% |
| Corsica | 63 | €4,532/ha | −3.2% |
| Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes | 964 | €4,057/ha | +1.3% |
| Nouvelle-Aquitaine | 1,450 | €3,995/ha | +5.5% |
| Occitanie | 636 | €3,333/ha | −8.2% |
| Overseas departments | 87 | €8,991/ha* | — |
| France | 6,329 | €4,936/ha | +1.9% |
Ponds trade at a very different level: a median of €25,235/ha in 2025 for the 300 ponds sold without buildings, according to our pond price observatory. On the listings side, 86 forests, woods, ponds and forest properties are offered on ma-propriete.fr as of 2 October 2026, mainly in Centre-Val de Loire (19), Nouvelle-Aquitaine (12), Occitanie (11), at a median asking price of €140,875 for a median size of about 9.8 ha. Our forest price report details the figures by department, and our notary fee calculator helps you work out the full cost of a purchase.
* Fewer than 100 sales: indicative value. Source: DVF (French tax authority), processed by ma-propriete.fr; forests of 1 ha or more, cadastral type woodland; ponds without buildings of at least 2,000 m²; July 2020 to December 2025; Moselle, Bas-Rhin, Haut-Rhin and Mayotte are not covered by DVF. Listings recorded on ma-propriete.fr on 2 October 2026.
For buyers who think like foresters, this is the core of the market: a commercial forest of several dozen hectares, either high forest of oak or beech or plantations of Douglas fir, maritime pine or spruce, managed to produce saw timber. Its value has two separate components: the land and its fertility (the “fonds”) and the standing trees (the “superficie”), which are assessed through a timber inventory. A mature stand costs more than a young plantation, but the buyer will often have to replant soon after the harvest.
Above roughly a hundred hectares, the French speak of a “domaine forestier”: a forest estate, a large wooded block in one piece or a few, served by tracks and timber stacking areas, sometimes with a hunting lodge or a keeper’s cottage. Such estates rarely change hands, often discreetly, and buyers are after the shooting and a family legacy as much as an income. Where a period residence comes with the woodland, the listing appears among our prestige forest estates.
Many properties combine woodland and water, from a single pond inside an oak wood to a chain of lakes in Sologne, the Brenne or the Dombes. When the water is the main asset, the property is listed among our lakes and ponds for sale. Buyers whose first interest is game, with high seats, rides and game crops, will look instead at our hunting estates and sporting properties for sale.
Many people search for a “maison forestière” hoping to find a house in the forest. Strictly speaking, the term refers to the former home of a state forest ranger; the French state has sold some of these houses once they were no longer needed. Our listings also include forests with a hunting lodge, a farmhouse or a family home. Always check the building’s planning status: an isolated house in a natural zone usually cannot be extended freely. In fire-prone departments, the owner is legally required to clear undergrowth around buildings (the “débroussaillement” obligation).
Two kinds of asset differ from owning a forest outright. Shares in French forestry groups give you a stake in woodland managed by others, for a smaller initial outlay but with limited liquidity. Forestry businesses for sale are aimed at professionals: here you take over a logging or timber extraction company, with its machinery and its customers, rather than buying trees.
French forest, overwhelmingly in private hands, is very unevenly spread: the south and east are heavily wooded, the north and west much less so, and it is often in these less wooded regions that a hectare costs most, as the table above shows.
Around Paris and along the Channel, demand from shooting buyers and city dwellers outstrips supply. Forests for sale in Normandy range from the beech woods of Eure and Seine-Maritime, around the state forest of Lyons, to the oak woods of Orne near the Bellême and Écouves forests. In Hauts-de-France woods and forests, the great public forests of Compiègne, Saint-Gobain and Mormal leave private owners with smaller woods and valley poplar plantations. Private forests in Île-de-France lie mainly in Seine-et-Marne, Yvelines, Essonne and Val-d’Oise.
In the west, woodland is shared among a great many owners. Forests for sale in Brittany combine hedgerow woods, oak and beech forests such as Paimpont, largely private and identified with the Brocéliande of Arthurian legend, and conifer plantations in the centre of the peninsula. Forest properties in Pays de la Loire are concentrated in Sarthe and Maine-et-Loire, between the oak high forest of Bercé and the oak, chestnut and pine woods of the Baugeois.
Forests for sale in Centre-Val de Loire cover Sologne, a land of shooting and ponds, the oak woods of Berry and Touraine, the Perche and the edges of the Orléans forest, mainland France’s most extensive state-owned forest. Forest properties in Bourgogne-Franche-Comté run from the Douglas fir plantations of the Morvan to the silver fir forests of Jura and Doubs, by way of the oak high forests of Nièvre and Haute-Saône. Forests in Grand Est combine the oak woods of Lorraine and the wet Champagne plain with the fir and spruce forests of the Vosges, hit hard by drought and bark beetles.
Forests for sale in Nouvelle-Aquitaine reflect the variety of mainland France’s largest forest region by area: the cultivated maritime pine forest of the Landes de Gascogne, the chestnut and oak woods of the Périgord and Limousin, and the Douglas fir of the Millevaches plateau. In Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes, fir, spruce and beech dominate from the Livradois-Forez to the Alps, on very fragmented private holdings; Allier is the exception, with oak woods around the state forest of Tronçais. Woodland in Occitanie ranges from the beech and fir forests of the Pyrenees and the Douglas fir of the Montagne Noire to the downy oak of the Quercy and the pine woods of the Causses.
Forests for sale in Provence-Alpes-Côte d’Azur combine holm and downy oak, Aleppo pine, the cork oak woods of the Maures and the larch forests of the Alps; wildfire risk shapes upkeep and access. In Corsica, the great Corsican pine (laricio) forests such as Aïtone and Vizzavona are publicly owned, and woods and wooded land for sale in Corsica are mostly holm oak, chestnut groves and plots in the interior.
Start by defining exactly what is for sale: cadastral plan, boundary survey if there is one, access and easements. Then have the standing timber valued by an independent forestry expert, a professional forest manager or a forestry cooperative; the inventory gives the volume by species and by size. Ask the seller for the felling history and any contracts in progress, such as a timber sale not yet harvested or a lease of the hunting rights, and check the health of the stands: bark beetle in spruce, ash dieback, decline of oak or chestnut. A forest without tracks that timber lorries can use is expensive to work.
When a property registered as woodland in the land register (cadastre) covers less than 4 ha, neighbours who own adjoining woods enjoy a right of first refusal (“droit de préférence”): the seller must tell them the price and conditions and give them two months to decide. For these small sales the commune has a similar right, which becomes a pre-emption right if it owns a neighbouring forest under public management, and the state can pre-empt a wood that borders a state forest. The SAFER, the rural land agency that can buy farmland ahead of a purchaser, cannot in principle pre-empt a forest sold on its own, apart from some very small isolated woods, but it can when woodland is sold together with farmland. The notaire clears all these rights before completion.
Since the law of 10 July 2023 on wildfire risk, any private forest of 20 ha or more, whether in one block or made up of nearby plots owned by the same person, must have a simple management plan (“plan simple de gestion”), a document validated by the CRPF, the regional body that advises private forest owners. The plan schedules fellings and works; the buyer either takes over the plan in force or has a new one drawn up. Without a recognised management document, large fellings need prior authorisation above thresholds set in each department, and clearing woodland for another use usually requires a permit.
Woodland benefits from a specific tax framework, whose conditions change with each finance act. Income from timber sales is taxed on a flat-rate basis, calculated from the cadastral rental value rather than the sums actually received. On gifts and inheritance, and for the French real estate wealth tax (IFI), forests can qualify for partial exemptions, provided they carry a guarantee of sustainable management and the owner signs a long-term management commitment. If the forest you are buying was passed on under this regime, ask the seller about the commitment in progress, which the buyer is often asked to continue. For the detail of these schemes, see our article on how French woods and forests are taxed.
The table above gives the national and regional medians recorded at sale, but two neighbouring woods can differ in value by a factor of two. The price of a hectare of forest depends on the soil, the species, the age and volume of the stands, access, the quality of the shooting and the size of the property. For a given forest, only a valuation by an expert, backed by a timber inventory, will support a well-argued offer.
A forest is a long-term holding. Income comes from timber sales, which vary from year to year, and sometimes from letting the shooting; costs include land tax, insurance, track maintenance, replanting and management fees. The annual yield stays modest, while the capital value follows land prices and the condition of the trees. Storms, fires and pest outbreaks can wipe out part of that capital overnight: suitable insurance and a mix of species reduce the risk.
Yes. Foreign nationals can buy French woodland on the same terms as residents, and the sale always goes through a notaire. Joint ownership in “indivision” is possible but fragile, since any co-owner can ask for the property to be divided at any time. For a family or group purchase, a forestry group (“groupement forestier”), a non-trading company whose purpose is to manage woodland, offers a sounder framework, with articles of association, a manager and rules on transferring shares.
Most absentee owners entrust their forest to a forestry expert, a professional forest manager or a cooperative, who draw up the management plan, mark and sell the timber and supervise the work. The regional forest owners’ centres also advise private owners and can point you to local professionals.
Filter the listings by region, department, size and price, compare those from private sellers, agents and notaires, and save an email alert so you hear about every new property that matches your criteria.
Publish your listing with the details buyers look at first: area, species, access, whether there is a management plan, shooting and any buildings. You decide how precisely the location is shown, and interested buyers contact you directly. The regional medians in the table above give you a first price benchmark, to be refined with an expert.
