An auberge for sale in France is usually a country inn: a restaurant, often with a few guest rooms and the owner's living quarters, set in a village, on a through road or in the mountains. On 25 September 2026, ma-propriete.fr lists 20 properties in this category, including former hotel-restaurants, thatched cottages in Brittany with commercial premises, estates combining a house, a gîte, a restaurant and a pool, holiday villages with catering, and rural properties with a former restaurant ready to reopen.
These listings are aimed at buyers who want to make a living from hospitality in the French countryside, at people taking over an existing business, at farmers looking for a farm inn, and at owners preparing to sell. They sit within our wider selection of tourism properties for sale in France. For context, read our article on agritourism, wine tourism and rural tourism in France.
Across the 20 listings online on 25 September 2026, the median asking price is €583,620. The middle half of listings ranges from €527,000 to €850,000; excluding the extremes (first to ninth decile), prices run from €408,000 to €1,290,000. The lowest asking price is €230,000 and the highest €2,980,000. The €500,000 to €1m band accounts for 11 listings: the price usually covers the buildings, a professional kitchen, guest rooms, the owner's accommodation and land.
| Asking price band | Number of listings |
|---|---|
| Under €250,000 | 1 |
| €250,000 to €500,000 | 4 |
| €500,000 to €1m | 11 |
| €1m to €2m | 3 |
| Over €2m | 1 |
Distribution of asking prices for auberges for sale. Source: listings published on ma-propriete.fr on 25 September 2026.
Treat these figures with care. They are asking prices set by sellers, not completed sale prices, and the sample is small: 20 listings, 4 of them in the Dordogne, and a single listing may appear in several categories. They show ranges, not a valuation; where a business is included, its trading results also count.
An auberge is organised around a dining room, a professional kitchen and usually a bar and terrace. Guest rooms turn it into a restaurant with rooms or a country inn, offering bed and breakfast, half board or full board, often around regional cooking. Check the dining room capacity, the kitchen and its extraction system, parking, and the separation between private quarters and public areas. The restaurant already makes an auberge an ERP (a building open to the public); guest rooms add fire-safety rules for sleeping accommodation. They count as chambres d'hôtes (bed and breakfast) only if the owner lives on site, within 5 rooms and 15 guests; otherwise they are a hotel business. If rooms matter most, see our hotels for sale section.
A ferme auberge is run by a farmer who serves meals made mainly from the farm's own produce. Buying one means buying a working farm with a hospitality activity attached. The buyer must qualify as a farmer, with MSA registration (the French agricultural social security scheme). Farmland purchases may also need authorisation to farm and can be pre-empted by the SAFER. It can also carry the Bienvenue à la ferme label. Searches focus on mountain areas and Alsace, particularly the Haut-Rhin. Contact the local chambre d'agriculture (chamber of agriculture) early. Our land valuation studies also give farmland prices in the commune.
The licence depends on the drinks served (restaurant licence for meals, licence III or IV for a bar), and the operator must hold the permis d'exploitation. The premises must meet ERP fire-safety and accessibility rules and food-hygiene standards. Some auberges belong to the commune, keen to keep a business in the village; the operator runs them under a lease or public service agreement.
French law distinguishes the property itself (les murs) from the business, known as the fonds de commerce (goodwill, name, equipment and contracts). You can buy both together, which gives full control of property and business; take over the business alone and rent the building, which lowers the initial outlay but makes the commercial lease central; or apply to run a village-owned auberge. Conversely, an investor can buy the building alone and let it to an operator on a commercial lease, in which case the rent and the tenant's solidity drive the return. The notaire, the public official who handles property sales in France, deals with the buildings; the sale of a business follows its own formalities (public notice, registration duties), usually with a lawyer or accountant.
Before signing a compromis de vente (the preliminary sale contract), check the licence and its transferability, recent accounts and EBITDA (EBE in French), which shows the business's capacity to repay a loan, kitchen compliance, property diagnostics, drainage and roofs. A cook or waiting staff transfer with the business, and a seller with under 250 employees must notify them before agreeing the sale. Estimate your costs with our notary fees calculator (in French) and build a financing plan (in French) including working capital. Our article on the taxation of holiday lettings gives a first overview for the rooms, to confirm with an accountant.
You may also find suitable properties among our gîtes for sale and wedding and event venues for sale, some of which include a kitchen or dining hall.
An auberge is a traditional country inn: a restaurant serving regional food, often with a few rooms, in a village or on a travel route. The word covers a range of properties, from a village restaurant with a bar to a coaching inn with rooms. Some are privately owned with the business included; others belong to the commune and are let to an operator. For buyers, it combines a home, premises open to the public and a business.
It depends on the drinks you serve. A restaurant licence covers alcohol served with meals; a bar also needs a licence III or IV, depending on the drinks; a licence IV cannot be newly created, only bought or transferred. In both cases, the operator must obtain the permis d'exploitation after a training course. When buying, confirm that the licence exists, belongs to the premises, has not lapsed through disuse and can be transferred; the mairie (town hall) and the notaire or lawyer handling the sale can advise. Unless they qualify as chambres d'hôtes, guest rooms follow hotel rules.
A ferme auberge, or farm inn, is a restaurant run by a farmer on the farm, with meals made mainly from the farm's produce. It is not simply a restaurant in the countryside: the hospitality activity extends the farming business, so the operator needs farmer status and MSA registration. It may carry the Bienvenue à la ferme label. Buying one means taking over an agricultural holding, so involve the chamber of agriculture and a notaire from the start.
On ma-propriete.fr, the median asking price of the 20 auberges listed on 25 September 2026 is €583,620, with the middle half between €527,000 and €850,000. Prices range from €230,000 to €2,980,000 depending on the buildings, the number of rooms, the land, the kitchen and whether the business is included. These are asking prices, not sale prices.
To hear about new country inns first, set up an email alert with your preferred regions and budget. Selling your auberge? List your property on ma-propriete.fr to reach buyers looking for exactly this kind of property: you set how precisely it appears on the map to keep the sale discreet with staff and regulars, and it can sit in several categories, such as tourism and prestige. Our white papers (in French) and financial tools and calculators (in French) help you prepare your project.
