Coming to France as permanent resident - help needed.
 

I am moving along with my wife to permanent residence to France. I am professional poker player and wondering about some issues
1) Is it legal to play poker online in france now? What is current state of things?
2) Is is taxable?
3) What banks say if I will withdraw my winnings to my bank account? Is it ok?
4) Is poker profits can be good as matter of income? I mean real estate loans etc?

If anyone has some time and can talk with me about issues on AIM/ICQ I will be more than thankfull. ty

Re: Coming to France as permanent resident - help needed.
 

1) Yes.*
2) Yes if its your only/main source of income.
3) If its a big amount they may report it to the irs but if you pay taxes on it no problem.
4) This probably will be a problem as poker player is not really considered a a real profession around here.

* The situation is a bit complicated as online poker room are forbidden from advertising in France because of the monopoly of a French company on money games. But the situation should change soon as this monopoly is illegal for the European commission.
No one as ever been arrested or sued for playing online poker i think.

Re: Coming to France as permanent resident - help needed.
 

BTW welcome to france [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

Re: Coming to France as permanent resident - help needed.
 

Akima,

I hope you make it because France really is a great place to be. But the paperwork is a nightmare.

Fortunately, (as a non-French resident) I work for a large French company and have a permanent contract. But without proof of a steady income you are likely to find even just renting very problematic.

But good luck. It's worth the effort [img]/images/graemlins/laugh.gif[/img]

Re: Coming to France as permanent resident - help needed.
 

i thought this thread made it clear there are no taxes on poker in france?

http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/showfl...=0#Post10954694

http://doc.impots.gouv.fr/aida/Apw.fcgi?...docFiscale.html

Re: Coming to France as permanent resident - help needed.
 

My wife will have contact in university at Nantes so there will be no problem. I hope there no laws that limit %% of salary going to renting? Because we want to rent a condo and my wife will have only 2500euro as salary as postdoc.

About no taxes for playing poker - that's very interesting, I will look into this threads.

And another problem - my frends telling me about high criminal rate at France. Is it true? I hope not [img]/images/graemlins/wink.gif[/img]



<font color="green">Oups, i wanted to quote your post i edited it. Back as before i think </font>

Re: Coming to France as permanent resident - help needed.
 

[ QUOTE ]
i thought this thread made it clear there are no taxes on poker in france?

http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/showfl...=0#Post10954694

http://doc.impots.gouv.fr/aida/Apw.fcgi?...docFiscale.html

[/ QUOTE ]

-You have a job and you win 10 millions in a poker tournament = you pay no taxes

-Poker is your job and you make 15000€/year you pay taxes.

The whole point is if its a game you practice for fun, beside a job or studies, or if its your only source of revenue.
In the first case it is true that whatever you win there are no taxes.

Re: Coming to France as permanent resident - help needed.
 

[ QUOTE ]
My wife will have contact in university at Nantes so there will be no problem. I hope there no laws that limit %% of salary going to renting? Because we want to rent a condo and my wife will have only 2500euro as salary as postdoc.

[/ QUOTE ]

Don't know about this king of law but usually owners will require a salary mush superior to the rent, with guaranties etc.. Maybe Nantes is nicer in this department as Paris is hell for renting.

[ QUOTE ]

About no taxes for playing poker - that's very interesting, I will look into this threads.

And another problem - my frends telling me about high criminal rate at France. Is it true? I hope not [img]/images/graemlins/wink.gif[/img]


[/ QUOTE ]

Yeah there are lot of tax criminals [img]/images/graemlins/wink.gif[/img]

Re: Coming to France as permanent resident - help needed.
 

I think that some players asked to their taxes controllers if they could have declare their benefits from the poker. All the differents cases haven't been exposed but I think that even if you're a professionnal poker player, you can't declare your winnings, because poker is considering as a hazard game in France. So you probably wouldn't have to pay taxes on your winnings, but you're not considering as a worker, you don't have any job.
I hope that you wouldn't have any problems to stay in France with your wife, but it is not as easy as you could think, in particular with our current governement.

Welcome to France

Re: Coming to France as permanent resident - help needed.
 

[ QUOTE ]

4) Is poker profits can be good as matter of income? I mean real estate loans etc?


[/ QUOTE ]

I am willing to pay to see your banker face when you tell him you are a professional gambler.

Welcome to France [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

Also if you think NL 1/2 is soft in Vegas try the 2/4 or even 5/5 in some parisian cardroom, you will see what soft games are.

Re: Coming to France as permanent resident - help needed.
 

Usually they won't rent you an appartment unless your income is at least 3 times the rent. Now the good news is that for a third of 2500 euros, you can get a pretty decent appartment and even a small house.
About crime in France, some suburbs are subject to unrest and crime but You will be very safe if you stay away from certain very specific suburbs which you may not even have to worry about in smaller cities.

Re: Coming to France as permanent resident - help needed.
 

One info you may find interesting, There is a casino in Dinard that does poker and I heard a lot of players are "live", if you care for a 2 hour drive once in a while from Nantes.
There might be something closer, I tell you if I find out.

Re: Coming to France as permanent resident - help needed.
 

Don't worry about crimes... As it has been said, there are some specific ghettos you'll quickly avoid, cause naming them is enough to know their reputation... Then we don't have weapons in France, so i guess it's safer than in US, because you'll never be afraid of a 12 years old kid...

But GAMBLER is not a recognised profession at all... You can be a professional poker player if you declare your earnings to the state... There are some pros in France... But you will NEVER get a loan if you don't have a real job and a regular salary...

Re: Coming to France as permanent resident - help needed.
 

I have never played poker in france outside of Paris but I have heard that poker is awfull in the casinos outside Paris. It seems the rake is uncapped (meaning some pot get rakked 200+ euros) and you dont play more than 15 hands / hour.

Re: Coming to France as permanent resident - help needed.
 

The problem with the questions you asked is that no one knows the answer to any of them for sure . the only sure thing is that your banker will probably laugh in your face if you want a loan based on your poker income.

Re: Coming to France as permanent resident - help needed.
 

[ QUOTE ]
One info you may find interesting, There is a casino in Dinard that does poker and I heard a lot of players are "live", if you care for a 2 hour drive once in a while from Nantes.
There might be something closer, I tell you if I find out.

[/ QUOTE ]
Nice coincidence as I was there two days ago...

They opened two NL 2/4 tables (on a sunday night), 100€ min, 4% rake uncapped. No dress code. The poker room is closed in october, will open again in november, adding STT and MTT starting from 100€. But being a pro you may not like the inevitable crapshoot structure...

Didn't play, just watched the action, looked like my online NL2/NL10. Seen a guy calling a paired/flushed board with A high where other guy obv had something. Very loose and passive players, the game looked definetly weak.

Be careful also when choosing your bank, some are tricky with Neteller and Moneybookers. I heard HSBC is fine.

Re: Coming to France as permanent resident - help needed.
 

[ QUOTE ]

Be careful also when choosing your bank, some are tricky with Neteller and Moneybookers. I heard HSBC is fine.

[/ QUOTE ]

That wouldn't include BNPParibas would it? I want to move to a site with rakeback, but the site I play will only cash out to credit card [because I made one deposit by CB] and requests for transfer to Neteller and Moneybookers go unaswered. [img]/images/graemlins/mad.gif[/img]

Re: Coming to France as permanent resident - help needed.
 

It's pretty random. For instance my bank seems to work with PokerStars, but no other site... Let's hope that this ridiculous situation with the EU will end soon.

I'd really advice HSBC for another reason : when you move abroad, the account transfer is free.

If you want more advice, you should go to www.clubpoker.net and ask there. Be careful, the forum is French only, you should request help from your wife...

(sorry if the link is considered as spam)

Re: Coming to France as permanent resident - help needed.
 

dont do it kid