The 12 questions, grouped
I group the questions in three clusters because that is how the answers cluster in practice. If a firm dodges on accreditation, do not even get to fees; if they answer well on accreditation but hedge on fees, negotiate hard; if they pass the first two blocks and hesitate on service, you probably still have a workable file.
Accreditation and liability (1 to 4)
Q1. Can I see your current accreditation letter and its date? A clean answer provides the letter in a PDF within the day, with a date that has not lapsed. A firm that responds with a generic brochure instead of the letter is not a firm to mandate.
Q2. Is the accreditation held by the legal entity I will be contracting with? Some groups hold accreditation in a sister company and route client files through it. The mandate should name the accredited entity as your counterparty, not a marketing shell.
Q3. Who carries the four-year post-filing liability, and how is it guaranteed? The right answer names the accredited entity and refers to its financial guarantee (bank, insurance, or reserve). A shrug here is a red flag.
Q4. What was the last tax-office query you handled, and how long did it take to close? You are testing for real operating experience. A firm that has handled queries in the last twelve months will give you a concrete, specific answer. A firm that cannot think of a recent one is either very small or very lucky, neither helps you.
Fees and money flow (5 to 8)
Q5. Will you quote me a flat fee and a percentage fee on the same file, so I can compare? If the firm refuses to quote a flat fee, assume the percentage is their best margin and negotiate accordingly. Never accept a single format quote when two formats exist in the market.
Q6. Does your fee include a four-year follow-up, or is that billed extra? A fee that does not include the audit-follow-up period is not actually a fee for the full mandate; it is a fee for the signature only, with a surprise invoice waiting for you.
Q7. Do you ever withhold an escrow on top of the fee, for "potential adjustments"? Some firms routinely hold 2% to 5% of the sale price for months after the deed. That practice is negotiable and, in many cases, avoidable. A flat refusal to cap or remove the hold-back is a red flag.
Q8. What additional costs will I see on the invoice? Translation, certified power of attorney, couriers, bank fees. A straight answer lists the lot; an evasive answer means these costs will appear at the end.
Service and communication (9 to 12)
Q9. Who will be my named contact person, and what is their direct line? A named contact is non-negotiable; a shared mailbox means you will chase for responses at the worst moments.
Q10. In which language is the mandate drafted, and in which language will you communicate with the French tax authority? The mandate can be bilingual without cost. Correspondence with the authority is always in French, so your contact must be able to forward translations promptly.
Q11. Will you share a written fee quote and a written mandate before I commit? A verbal quote has no value. The mandate should be in writing, signed, countersigned, and kept in your own file.
Q12. What is your response-time commitment during the 60 days around the deed? Ask for a number, in hours. Anything slower than 48 hours in that window is too slow for a file this time-sensitive.
A worked example: two firms, same file
Take an Australian seller with a €550,000 sale near Antibes, a clean cost basis, 14 years of holding. Firm A quotes 0.7% of the sale price (€3,850), bundles the four-year follow-up, and offers an English mandate. Firm B quotes a €1,450 flat fee, bundles the follow-up, and confirms no escrow hold-back. Both are accredited and both can be on file within two weeks. On the same file, the same signature, the same risk profile, the seller saves €2,400 by choosing Firm B, and loses nothing measurable. That is the typical delta between a percentage-only firm and a flat-fee firm on standard files above half a million euros.
The pitfall most buyers of this service hit
Sellers read online that "representative fees are 0.4% to 1%" and accept the percentage without asking for a flat quote. That statistic is accurate for what firms propose first, it is not accurate for what firms accept after negotiation. Ask for both formats in writing and compare on the same file. Firms that refuse are telling you something useful about how they intend to work with you over the next four years.
One pro-level tip
Send the same twelve questions, in the same email, to three accredited firms on the same day. Set a 72-hour reply deadline. Responses come back with very different energy, which itself is data. The firm that answers within 24 hours, with the accreditation letter attached and a flat-fee quote ready, is usually the firm that will also answer the tax-office letter three years from now. Communication speed in the sales cycle predicts communication speed in the follow-up, almost without exception.
Key takeaways
- Ask for the accreditation letter, the name of the accredited entity, and the four-year liability terms before anything else.
- Always request a flat-fee quote alongside the percentage quote; compare on the same file.
- Pin down translation, power of attorney, and hold-back policies in writing before signing.
- Response time before the mandate predicts response time during the four-year follow-up window.
Frequently asked questions
Is the cheapest accredited representative always a bad choice?
Not automatically. A low flat fee is defensible on a simple file: non-inherited, non-SCI, with a clean cost basis and a straightforward holding period. On complicated files with foreign spouses, partial gifts, or undocumented works, a low fee usually means the representative will take the safest (most expensive) reading of your gain.
Should I sign with the representative my notaire recommends?
Only after asking the same twelve questions you would ask anyone else. Notaires often work with one or two representatives out of habit, not because the fit is best for your file. An outside quote gives you a baseline and, in practice, an opening to renegotiate the recommended firm.
What happens if I have already signed with a firm I am uneasy about?
Most mandates include a withdrawal window of 14 days under French consumer law if you signed remotely. If you are past that window, you can still negotiate a handover to another representative before the deed; the first firm may invoice a partial fee for work done, but it cannot hold your file hostage.
Do I need an English-speaking representative?
Strongly recommended. Tax wording is technical and mistranslation on a return costs real money. An English-speaking contact person also reduces the risk that a request from the tax authority reaches you two weeks late because the first email was in French and went to a spam folder.