Karim advises companies on their property moves: an office floor to take over, a logistics warehouse on the outskirts, commercial premises to sell. His job is to know who owns what, and to reach the right person within the rules. Since August 11, 2026, he has one specific question: do I have the right to call this SCI manager whose contact details I found online?
The answer, in commercial real estate, is not the same as in residential property. You are addressing professionals about their business assets: you operate under a distinct legal framework from the historical opt-out rules that apply to private individuals. You need to know it, document it, and build a list that complies with it from the very first line. This article explains how to identify holders of commercial premises and build a qualified, compliant contact list, using Outsend as your only tool.
The commercial real estate market and who the professional property owners are
In commercial real estate, the holder of an asset is rarely a private individual in the traditional sense: most often it is a legal entity: a property-holding SCI (société civile immobilière), a holding company, an operating company that owns its own premises, or a real estate investment firm. Your contact is therefore a professional acting in the course of their business activity, which changes the legal basis for reaching out to them.
Offices, retail premises, logistics warehouses, business goodwill, and commercial leases make up a market distinct from residential property, driven by portfolio rebalancing, lease renewals, and asset sales. Holding commercial premises through a société civile immobilière is common practice in France, as it separates property assets from the operating business. The practical implication for you: behind a given property there is often a legal entity, and its manager is the person to contact. Identifying that entity and its legal representative is the core of sourcing work. It is also what distinguishes this profession from sourcing landowners for a property developer.
The B2B cold outreach framework post-2026: legitimate interest, right to object, and the difference from Bloctel
In commercial real estate, you are not approaching a consumer: you are speaking to a professional about their business tool. So different rules apply. Outreach between professionals is governed by a different set of rules from those applying to private individuals. France's data protection authority, the CNIL, recognizes that B2B prospecting can rely on the legal basis of legitimate interest, provided the subject of the solicitation is related to the professional activity of the person contacted and that they can easily object. You do not need prior consent, but you must respect the right to object.
The CNIL (2026) illustrates this principle with the example of an approach directed at a decision-maker regarding a tool relevant to their role: outreach is permissible as long as it relates to their profession and a way to object is provided. For a commercial real estate advisor, proposing a property valuation study to the manager of an SCI that owns commercial premises falls, by its very nature, within the scope of that person's professional activity.
Private individuals are a different case. For them, Légifrance (2026) sets out in Article L. 223-1, applicable from August 11, 2026, the prohibition on telephone canvassing of a consumer who has not previously expressed consent, defined as a manifestation of will that is "free, specific, informed, unambiguous, and revocable." On that date, the Bloctel opt-out service stopped operating: for private individuals, opt-out was replaced by opt-in. For the difference between the two regimes, our guide on B2B telephone canvassing and the August 11, 2026 law explains where your professional contacts end and private individuals begin. See also our article on the August 11, 2026 law applied to real estate prospecting.
Calling a natural person on their personal line, even about a property they hold directly, brings you closer to the consumer regime. It depends on who you are calling and how the call relates to their professional activity. When in doubt, a professional written message is the safest route.
Public sources for identifying holders of commercial premises
Several public and free databases allow you to trace back to the owning entity and its manager, without buying a third-party file of unknown origin. The right approach combines legal company data, a directors' register and real estate transaction data, all in a single list.
France's Sirene directory, maintained by INSEE, has accumulated close to 25 million businesses and 36 million establishments since 1973, ceased entities included (INSEE, page updated 17 October 2024); as of 2 October 2026, 14,351,029 establishments are active and publicly listed (outsend measurement on the Sirene open data stock). It is free open data, with legal form, activity code, address, and SIREN/SIRET identifiers. It is the starting point for identifying an SCI or property company and placing it geographically. The Registre national des entreprises (RNE, National Business Register), freely and openly distributed by INPI (2026), adds directors and legal representatives, which tells you who to contact at the entity. Some natural persons can ask for these details to be kept confidential.
On the transaction side, the Demandes de valeurs foncières (DVF) database published on data.gouv.fr (DGFiP, 2026) records property transfers over recent years with the property type, surface area and price, but without the names of the parties. It does not provide contact details, but it maps activity in a given area and flags recently traded assets. To link those signals to contactable entities, you then cross-reference with legal data: that is what Outsend does. It can enrich a list with SIRET, SIREN, VAT, and RCS data and surface legal form and directors to qualify the list.
Building a qualified, compliant list with Outsend
The compliant method starts with a territory and a target business profile, builds the list on demand, then enriches it with legal data before any contact is made. Outsend runs all these steps in one tool instead of four separate subscriptions, which also reduces the risk of inconsistencies between tools.
In practice, you define your territory (a business district, a logistics zone, a shopping street) and the type of establishments you are targeting. Outsend builds the list from that geographic area, with name, address, phone number, website, and public reviews, rather than drawing from a static global database. You then enrich each record with legal form (SCI, SAS, holding company), SIREN number, and director, then chain the steps together in a no-code prospecting pipeline so the steps run automatically. For written outreach, the professional email finder and deliverability check via inbox test stop you from writing to addresses that do not work. The principle of a clean telephone file for B2B outreach applies in exactly the same way to your real estate lists.
Compliance does not stop at collection. The CNIL (2021) states in its reference framework on managing commercial activities that data relating to a non-customer prospect may be kept for three years from the date of collection or the last contact initiated by that person; beyond that, you must either re-engage to confirm their interest or delete the data. Your list must therefore be kept up to date, cleaned regularly, and record all objections received.
Table: two regimes, two contact logics
Approaching a professional property owner and approaching a private individual follow different rules. This table sums up the two regimes.
| Criterion | Professional contact (B2B) | Private individual contact (B2C) |
|---|---|---|
| Legal basis (CNIL) | Legitimate interest, solicitation linked to the person's professional activity | Prior consent (telephone, from 11/08/2026) |
| Recipient mechanism | Right to object, to be offered and respected | Opt-in: they must have said yes in advance |
| Bloctel service | Outside the scope of the professional regime | Closed since 11/08/2026 |
| Data retention | 3 years from collection or last contact initiated by the person (CNIL) | |
The commercial real estate advisor's compliance checklist
Before launching a sourcing campaign, check that every step is compliant. A compliant list is prepared before the campaign, not after a complaint from a director.
A few concrete control points: target legal entities and professional directors, and ensure your solicitation relates to their activity; favor a formal written approach when you may be reaching a personal line; include and document a simple opt-out mechanism in every message; keep a record of the source of each contact detail; apply the three-year retention period and purge anything beyond it. For operational reliability, a dead URL check prevents you from re-approaching dissolved entities, and enrichment with additional phone numbers improves your chances of reaching the right person.
FAQ: compliant sourcing in commercial real estate
Can I cold-call an SCI that owns commercial premises after August 11, 2026?
The professional regime differs from the consumer one: the CNIL recognizes B2B prospecting on the basis of legitimate interest, provided the solicitation is linked to the person's professional activity and a right to object is offered. A property valuation study addressed to the manager of an SCI that owns commercial premises falls within that framework. If you call a personal line, the consumer rules may apply.
Is prior consent required to contact a professional director?
The prior opt-in requirement set out in Article L. 223-1 as of August 11, 2026 applies to telephone canvassing of consumers. For a director acting in the course of their professional activity, the basis recognized by the CNIL is legitimate interest combined with a right to object, not consent collected in advance.
Where can I find the owner of commercial premises for free?
INSEE's Sirene directory and INPI's Registre national des entreprises are both free and open data: they provide legal form, identifiers, and directors. The DGFiP's DVF database maps transactions without naming the parties. Outsend cross-references these sources to link a property to a contactable entity.
Does the DVF database give the name of the property owner?
No. The Demandes de valeurs foncières database records the property type, surface area, price, and location of transfers, but does not contain the names of the parties to the transaction. It is useful for spotting a recently traded asset or gauging activity in an area; to identify the contactable entity, you then cross-reference it with Sirene and the RNE.
What is the difference from land sourcing for a property developer?
Sourcing commercial premises targets entities that hold offices, warehouses, or retail walls in use. Sourcing land for a property developer or property dealer targets plots and landowners, with different sources and a different logic; we cover that in a separate article on sourcing landowners.
What are the risks of non-compliant telephone canvassing?
Breaches of telephone canvassing rules expose you to administrative sanctions. Article L. 242-16 of the French Consumer Code provides that any breach of Articles L. 223-1 to L. 223-5 (which govern the right to object to telephone canvassing) is punishable by an administrative fine of up to €75,000 for a natural person and €375,000 for a legal entity. The best protection remains documenting your legal basis, your data sources, and all objections received.
Need a full overview? See the guide to compliant real estate prospecting.
This article provides general information and does not constitute personalized legal advice. For specific situations, consult a lawyer specializing in real estate law or GDPR.