Office space in Monaco: premises that satisfy your business authorisation
We choose the tenure, read the lease against the statutes that decide it, and build the occupancy title the Direction du Développement Économique accepts.
- The authorisation names the premises limitatively (Loi n° 1.144, Art. 5)
- Four tenures, not three (Loi n° 490; Code civil, Arts. 1616-1 to 1616-7)
- Lease registration duty 1% of the cumulated rent (Loi n° 580, Art. 9, 2°)
- We let no space and list no offices
Premises are part of the authorisation, not a detail beside it
The ministerial decision determines limitatively the activities carried on and the premises where they are deployed; any change of premises calls for a new authorisation (Loi n° 1.144, Art. 5, read live 2026-09-19). It is granted only where an appropriate operational infrastructure exists. Which seat each legal form may use, and for how long, sits in the domiciliation guide.
Our work is the premises half of that file, inside the chain that starts with registering a company in Monaco. We are not an estate agent, a letting agent, a landlord, a business centre or a domiciliation provider within Loi n° 1.362, Art. 1er, 29°: no inventory of ours.
What is included
Six things, and the boundary with them.
The tenure, against the activity. Which of the six ways to hold premises fits what the business does.
The lease, read before signature. Renewal, indemnity, rent review, key money, exit, assignment, pre-emption: what the statutes decide.
Sizing against the benchmarks. The DDE's 9 sqm and 25 sqm exclusive-office figures, and the appropriate-operational-infrastructure condition over the rest.
The occupancy title the DDE accepts. The registered lease or the centre contract, and the two consents where the premises are another's.
Registration with the Direction des Services Fiscaux. The lease presented, the duty computed on the cumulated rent, a guarantee apart.
The technical commission. What it inspects, how the sub-commission visits, what its procès-verbal means.
No premises, no address, no desk, no availability list, no operator recommended.
The four tenures, side by side
A fourth tenure exists that the government's SARL and SAM pages do not list: the statutory office lease of Loi n° 1.433 of 8 November 2016, opt-in and exclusive of the commercial-lease statute (Code civil, Art. 1616-1). The form pages list three; the private-premises procedure page of 08/09/2026 accepts a bail à usage de bureau et/ou mixte. Both read 2026-09-19.
| Tenure | Statute and articles | Term | How the tenant gets out | Renewal right | Eviction indemnity | Key money | Rent review | Who it suits |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Commercial lease (bail commercial) | Loi n° 490 of 24 November 1948, Arts. 1, 2, 9, 18, 21 to 24, 32 bis, 32 ter | Renewed term at least three and at most nine years (Art. 2) | No statutory tenant's break; the lease's own terms | Automatic unless waived at least three months before expiry (Art. 2) | Due where renewal is refused without grave and legitimate reasons; no departure before payment (Arts. 9, 18) | The statute, read in full, contains no prohibition | Up or down, three years after the current rent took effect, then the commission arbitrale (Arts. 21, 22) | Premises where a fonds is operated |
| Office lease (bail à usage de bureau) | Code civil, Arts. 1616-1 to 1616-7 | Written, at least five years, tacit renewal for an equal term (Art. 1616-3) | At any time after the first year, six months' notice (Art. 1616-4) | Either party may refuse at expiry on six months' notice (Art. 1616-4) | None (Art. 1616-6) | Prohibited on entry (Art. 1616-6) | Freely fixed, annual INSEE construction-cost indexation unless agreed otherwise (Art. 1616-5) | Intellectual work, clients received, no goods delivered or stored; a Monegasque legal person may fix its seat there (Art. 1616-2) |
| Short lease | The government's own category, "durée inférieure à 36 mois" | Under 36 months | Not published | Not published; below the three-year fonds threshold on our reading | Not published | Not published | Not published | A short occupation |
| Convention d'occupation précaire | Named on the government's seat page | Not published | Not published | Not published | Not published | Not published | Not published | Premises of the State's public domain only |
| Business-centre contract | Accepted as an occupancy title (procedure page, 08/09/2026) | The formula's own conditions; the duration caps belong to the domiciliation guide | The contract's terms; not published | The lease statutes do not apply | Not applicable | Not applicable | Not published | The DDE's published formulas; only the exclusive office allows staff to be hired, and regulated activities are outside every one |
| Hosted premises | Loi n° 490, Art. 3 for a sublease; the two consents on the procedure page | The head lease's own term | Follows the head lease | Follows the head lease | Follows the head lease | Not published | Follows the head lease | A business hosted by another; the host answers under Loi n° 1.144, Arts. 9, 6° and 14 |
The four tenures and the two other ways to hold premises, with the article behind each cell.
The statute turns on a fonds operated for three consecutive years (Art. 1er); that a lease under 36 months falls below it is our reading, not its words. A clause forbidding assignment is void and both parties hold pre-emption rights (Arts. 32 bis, 32 ter), where a lease meets a fonds de commerce in Monaco.
From choosing the premises to the inspection: how the file runs
1. Check the route. A foreign company's agency, branch, administrative or representative office needs its own authorisation (Art. 5, second paragraph): an administrative office in Monaco.
- 01
-
choose the premises and the tenure
- 02
-
occupancy title
- 03
-
the decision names the premises limitatively
- 04
-
address declared at the DDE
- 05
-
lease registered with the Direction des Services Fiscaux at 1% of the cumulated rent
- 06
-
the technical commission visits and issues prescriptions. A red return path underneath: a move means a new authorisation
Art. 5
- 07
-
losing premises adapted to the activity is a revocation ground
Art. 9
Statutory steps and the return path; no cumulative period is drawn
2. Decide what the premises must do. Only the exclusive office allows hiring in a centre; shared formulas carry no staff, no clients, no storage; an office lease excludes goods and trade.
3. Choose the tenure, not the label: the renewal right and the indemnity, against the five-year office lease with its one-year exit.
4. Find the premises. The DDE publishes three types of professional premises; the Monaco Business Office holds a list of available private premises, non-exhaustive and indicative.
5. Negotiate and sign. An office lease is written, at least five years. Clauses whose direct consequence is to defeat Loi n° 490 (Art. 28) or the office-lease section (Art. 1616-7) are void.
6. Register the lease with the Direction des Services Fiscaux. 1% of the cumulated rent, as the table below sets out. No filing deadline is published.
7. Declare the address and put the premises into the file. Neither authorisation nor RCI entry is delivered without it; a foreign national declares from notification.
8. The inspection, and afterwards. The commission intervenes at fitting-out, modification, opening or operation. A move means a new authorisation, and the address passes with neither lease nor shares: the existing companies rules and deadlines.
No total is published: the only periods here are the statutory ones.
Not sure which tenure your authorisation needs?
Tell us the activity, the headcount and whether clients come.
The occupancy title: what the DDE accepts, and the two consents
What proves the right to occupy, and what is asked when the premises are another's.
- Declare the company's address and prove the right to occupy.
- The lease registered with the Direction des Services Fiscaux: commercial, office, mixed or residential.
- The contract concluded with a business centre.
- The owner's consent.
- The principal tenant's consent: a registered sublease or an attestation de mise à disposition gracieuse.
- Under a commercial lease the owner has fifteen days to join a subletting deed; silence is passed over (Art. 3).
- An occupancy title in every case, the first post-authorisation formality.
- Admitting undeclared or unauthorised activities in one's premises is a revocation ground (Art. 9, 6°) and an offence (Art. 14).
Landlord, principal tenant and business centre therefore vet who sits in the space, a domiciliation provider being an obliged entity under Loi n° 1.362: Monaco's grey-listing by the FATF.
What the State charges when the lease is registered
Duties with an effective date, for acts presented from 1 October 2023, not prices: our fee is on request. Loi n° 580 of 29 July 1953 fixes each rate, read live 2026-09-19.
| Act registered | Rate | Article | When it falls due |
|---|---|---|---|
| Lease of limited duration; subleases, subrogations, assignments and retrocessions | 1% of the cumulated rent | Art. 9, 2° | At the start of each period on a three-, six- or nine-year lease |
| Guarantee (cautionnement) of a lease | 0.50% | Art. 8, 2° | On registration of the guarantee |
| Fixed duty, and the minimum collection where a proportional duty produces less | EUR 50 | Art. 2 | Acts presented from 1 October 2023; the government's summary page still shows EUR 10, and the statute controls |
| The domiciliation step at the DDE, the technical commission's visit, a change of premises | Not published | Not published | Not published |
| VAT on office rents; the property-transfer duties | Not on this page | Not on this page | VAT belongs with the VAT pages; transfer duties belong to a purchase, never to a lease |
Statutory duties on a lease, with the article and the effective date.
Renting in Monaco does not settle the company's tax position: the profits tax turns on turnover realised outside Monaco.
What an office costs to enter, and what nobody prices
Every rent below is a dated market observation, never an official statistic.
- the advertised monthly rent
- tagged
[market]and dated - plus the agency scale of 10% of one year's rent from each party and a deposit of three to six months
- plus 1% of the cumulated rent payable at the start of each three-year period
- plus 0.50% on a lease guarantee. Every block labelled
[market]or "statutory duty". No total - no recommended figure
Market observations and statutory duties side by side; no block is a statistic
What is advertised. EUR 1,500 a month for 10 sqm, EUR 2,000 to 3,600 for 25 sqm, EUR 19,500 for 170 sqm [market: Chambre Immobilière de Monaco and montecarlo-realestate.com · 2026-09-08]. About EUR 150 and EUR 80 to 144 per sqm: our arithmetic.
What sits beside the rent. An agency's scale of 10% of a year's rent from each party, a three-to-six-month deposit [market: miells.com · 2026-09-08], 6% and 3% on an assignment of droit au bail [market: lifeproperties.mc · 2026-09-08], and the 1% duty.
Desks and centres. Coworking is advertised from EUR 25 a day and EUR 250 a month [market: SERP snippets 2026-09-19]; formulas and tariffs belong to the business-centre page.
What nobody publishes. IMSEE's observatory covers sales of private housing and carries no rent data, so no official office-rent series exists. Portal counts are listings on a day: 257 on one portal, 227 and 229 on another. Personal costs: Company in Monaco: Cost of Living in Monaco.
"Virtual office" and "business address": what they cannot carry
Four of the eight keywords here ask for a mailbox: what the offers are, and where the law stops them.
What is on sale. Mail handling, a prestige address, a telephone line, from EUR 2 a day and EUR 58 a month, and one centre's mail-only address with no workspace [market: SERP snippets 2026-09-19; monacobusinesspartner.com]. No DDE formula is mail-only.
The statutory ceiling. Having no installation or staff allowing a real activity on Monegasque territory is a ground for suspension or revocation (Art. 9, 8°); hosting an undeclared or unauthorised activity is an offence (Art. 14). The full test sits on the domiciliation guide above.
The two things an address cannot do. It does not let a foreign company invoice from Monaco: an agency, branch, administrative or representative office needs its own authorisation (Art. 5, second paragraph). Substance is read by more than the DDE: Company in Monaco: Business Bank Account in Monaco.
Ready to put the premises into your authorisation file?
Send the activity, the premises considered and the draft lease.
Why work with us
Camille Perrin, formation and authorisation lead: eight years inside a Monegasque domiciliation and business-centre operator, where the premises condition is decided in practice.
From our practice: the lease read against both regimes before signature, the occupancy title fixed before the rent, the duty and the inspection in the timetable from the start.
Prepared by Camille Perrin · Reviewed by Julien Rossi · Updated {{BUILD_DATE}}
Start the file
Send the tenure considered, the activity and the draft lease.
Start your Monaco file
Tell us the activity, where it will be carried on and who will run it. One of us reads it and comes back with the questions the authorisation file will ask. Our fees are on request.
The authorisation is personal and non-transferable, and it names the activity and the premises. Nothing on this site is sold ready to trade.
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