Annual Costs of Owning a Property in Morocco: Taxes, Syndic and Upkeep

Every owner of built property in Morocco pays two annual taxes: the taxe d'habitation (TH) and the taxe de services communaux (TSC). Both sit in Loi 47-06 on local taxation, and both are worked out on the valeur locative, the property's assessed annual rental value, not on what you paid for it or what it would fetch today.

As of 2026, Article 27 of the law sets the TH rate on a sliding scale: nothing on a rental value up to 5,000 dirhams, 10% between 5,001 and 20,000 dirhams, 20% between 20,001 and 40,000 dirhams, and 30% above that. Article 24 then cuts that rental value by 75% if the property is your main residence, or that of your spouse, parent or child, which covers most MREs who keep a family home in Morocco. The TSC, under Article 36, is simpler: 10.5% of the same rental value for property inside an urban perimeter, a delimited centre, or a seaside, winter-sports or thermal resort, and 6.5% everywhere else covered by a development plan. Article 23 also means the rental value itself is reassessed every five years, with a flat 2% rise each time, rather than reset to the market.

We go deeper into how the valeur locative gets set and the declaration you need to file in our dedicated article on property tax for owners abroad. What matters here is that both taxes are annual, both are due whether or not you ever set foot in the property, and neither rises simply because your address is abroad.

Buy an apartment rather than a standalone house and there is a third annual cost the tax office has nothing to do with: your share of the building's running costs, fixed by the syndic and the general assembly of co-owners. This is governed by Loi 18-00 on the co-ownership of built properties, as amended by Loi 106-12.

Your share is not something you negotiate once it is set. Article 9 of the law requires the building's règlement de copropriété to fix each owner's portion of the common charges according to their quote-part, the fraction of the shared parts attached to their specific unit, and that split can only be changed by a vote of the general assembly or a court under Article 37. Each year, the general assembly approves a budget and a reserve for major works within six months of the previous accounting year closing, and owners pay their share in instalments, typically quarterly, under Article 24. The same assembly can also vote, by a three-quarters majority, to take out collective insurance against fire, explosion or water damage affecting the building, under Article 21, though nothing obliges it to.

This is the cost buyers abroad most often get wrong, because unlike the two taxes above it is not fixed by statute. It depends entirely on what your specific building decides to spend, and on how well the syndic actually collects it from everyone else.

Water and electricity are billed by the local distributor in your city and carry a standing charge even in months the property sits empty, on top of whatever you actually use. Budget for this whether you let the place, use it a few weeks a year, or leave it shut. A disconnected meter does not restart itself, and reconnecting one is slower and costlier than paying the minimum to keep it live.

Beyond utilities, a well-run co-owned building should be building a reserve, a compte de réserve, for the unusual or urgent repairs an annual budget does not cover, such as a lift overhaul or a roof fix. Article 37 bis of Loi 18-00 lets the general assembly fund this through extra contributions on top of the regular charge, and the syndic can draw on it in an emergency as long as every owner is told in writing afterwards. A building with no reserve fund is not cheaper to own. It is simply storing the bill for later, usually as one large call for funds rather than a predictable annual one.

Miss the property taxes and Article 147 of Loi 47-06 applies a 10% penalty plus a 5% surcharge for the first month of delay and 0.5% for every month after that, calculated on the amount paid late. There is one exemption worth knowing: this penalty does not apply to the TH or TSC at all if the amount due on either tax is 1,000 dirhams or less.

Miss a syndic charge and the process is different but no gentler. Under Article 25, the syndic can chase you through the courts without needing the general assembly's permission first. If a formal notice sent by registered letter goes unanswered for more than 30 days, every instalment you owe for the year becomes payable at once, and the syndic can ask the court for an injunction to pay, backed by the minutes approving the budget, your account statement and proof of your ownership share, under Articles 25 and 25 bis. None of this requires you to be in the country. It only requires the bill to go unpaid.

None of these bills wait for you to notice them from Paris or Montreal. The practical fix most owners abroad settle on is a Moroccan bank account used only for the property, holding enough to cover the tax bill, the quarterly syndic call and a utility buffer, topped up a few times a year rather than chased payment by payment. Opening one as a non-resident is more straightforward than owners expect, and it means a missed registered letter does not turn into a court injunction while you are asleep in a different time zone.

If the property is let out, whoever manages that let is usually the one paying these bills first and reconciling with you afterwards, which is one more reason to put that arrangement in writing before the keys change hands.