A four-bedroom villa in the hills of La Californie asks €30,000 a week in July and two to three times that over the Cannes Film Festival, which ran 12 to 23 May in 2026. The airport, Nice Côte d’Azur, is a 30 to 40 minute drive, or seven minutes by helicopter at the top of the market. The full structure, by area and season.
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The number that matters first: €8,000 to €350,000 per week. That is the real spread for villa rentals in Cannes, and where you land inside it depends on the area, the week of the year, the number of bedrooms, and whether the house is a staffed hillside estate with a sea view or a simpler villa back from the front. Cannes is a two-festival town, and the calendar, not the house, sets the rate.
The single peak is the Cannes Film Festival in May, when a villa rate runs two to three times its July level and the best hillside estates are gone a year out. July and August are the second peak, with the Cannes Lions advertising festival in June a third spike. The most expensive single combination is the Festival fortnight at a staffed estate in La Californie with a Bay of Cannes view.
Indicative weekly rates in euros. Low season is roughly November to March. Shoulder is April, May outside the Festival, and October. The summer-and-Festival column carries July, August, and the Film Festival fortnight, the single apex of the year. Staffed La Californie estates sit at the top of each band.
| Villa size | Low season | Shoulder | Summer + Film Festival peak |
|---|---|---|---|
| 3 bedrooms | €8,000 to €15,000 | €14,000 to €25,000 | €25,000 to €50,000 |
| 4 bedrooms | €15,000 to €28,000 | €25,000 to €45,000 | €42,000 to €85,000 |
| 5 bedrooms | €25,000 to €45,000 | €40,000 to €70,000 | €70,000 to €140,000 |
| 6+ bedrooms | €45,000 to €90,000 | €80,000 to €150,000 | €130,000 to €350,000+ |
Bands reflect La Californie, Super Cannes, and the Mougins side, May 2026. The Film Festival fortnight is the apex inside the summer column: a staffed sea-view estate that asks €60,000 in July can clear €150,000 or more over the Festival, often on a strict two-week minimum.
Three areas anchor the luxury market, and they feel different. La Californie, the hillside east of the centre, holds the grand Belle Epoque and modern villas with the best Bay of Cannes views, a short drive down to the Croisette. This is the heart of the high-end rental market and the most expensive pocket over the Festival.
Super Cannes, the ridge above La Californie, climbs higher for bigger lots, more privacy, and the panoramic view across to the Esterel and the bay, at a small premium for the seclusion. Inland, the Mougins and Mandelieu sides offer larger gardens and more house for the money, at the cost of the sea view and a longer drive to the Croisette. The waterfront itself, the Croisette, is hotels and apartments rather than villas.
France applies a reduced 10 percent VAT to professionally managed and serviced accommodation, the same reduced band that covers hotels. A villa let directly by a private owner is generally outside VAT, with the owner taxed on the rental income rather than charging the guest VAT. On a managed €60,000 summer week the 10 percent line is €6,000.
On top of the rate, Cannes charges a taxe de séjour per person per night. For unclassified furnished tourist rentals, the category most villas fall into, the rate is 5 percent of the per-person, per-night price excluding tax, capped at about €5.36 per person per night in 2026, a figure that includes the additional regional levy funding the Provence-Côte d’Azur rail line (Mairie de Cannes, 2026 tariff schedule). The tax is real but small against the rate.
Expect an end-of-stay cleaning fee of €500 to €2,000 depending on the size of the estate, and on staffed villas a concierge element covering the arrival, the provisioning, and a local contact. Many of the larger hillside estates include a housekeeper and a gardener in the rate.
A private chef on the Riviera runs €350 to €600 per day plus food, above the Italian equivalent. A car with a driver is common given the hillside lanes and the Festival traffic, at roughly €400 to €700 per day, and a helicopter transfer from Nice runs a few thousand euros at the top of the market.
Plan on a refundable deposit of €5,000 to €50,000 depending on the value of the estate, held by card or transfer and returned within two to four weeks of checkout. Festival lets often carry the steepest deposits and the strictest cancellation terms.
Each budget is built from the rate plus the fees that actually land on the invoice. In Cannes the line items add 12 to 18 percent, and the Festival fortnight is a category of its own.
Headline: €18,000 / wk (April, hillside villa with bay view).
VAT (10%) €1,800. Cleaning €600. Taxe de séjour for two, seven nights about €75. Hire car €500.
All-in: about €20,975 for the week, roughly €2,995 a night for a house that sleeps six.
Headline: €55,000 / wk (July peak, ridge villa with pool and panoramic view).
VAT (10%) €5,500. Cleaning €1,200. Taxe de séjour for eight, seven nights about €300. Chef for four dinners €2,000 plus food €1,000. Car with driver three days €1,800.
All-in: about €66,800 for the week, roughly €9,540 a night for eight.
Headline: €120,000 / wk (Festival, staffed sea-view estate, two-week minimum).
VAT (10%) €12,000. Cleaning €2,000. Taxe de séjour for ten, seven nights about €375. Full-time chef €3,500 plus food €2,500. Two cars with drivers €6,000.
All-in: about €146,375 for the week, before the second Festival week and activities.
Three levers move the all-in cost on a Cannes week.
Avoid the Festival fortnight. A villa over the Cannes Film Festival in May costs two to three times its July rate, and a mid-June or September week in the same house, with the sea just as warm, costs a fraction of it. Unless the Festival is the reason for the trip, the date is where the money goes.
Go up the hill or inland for space. Renters fixate on the bay view in La Californie and book a four-bedroom there when the same budget buys a larger, more private estate in Super Cannes or on the Mougins side with a short drive to the Croisette. The ridge and the inland pockets earn their lower rate without dropping quality.
Take the shoulder weather. April, May outside the Festival, June, and September are warm and clear, with the Croisette and the restaurants open and uncrowded, at 30 to 45 percent below the July and August peak. The Riviera shoulder is one of the best-value windows in the luxury market.
Cannes in summer is hot and dry, with July and August afternoons clearing 28 to 30 Celsius and the occasional Mistral wind sweeping down the Rhône valley to the coast, cooler and gusty. The sea is swimmable from June into October. A villa without proper air conditioning in the bedrooms is uncomfortable in the peak, so confirm it covers every room, not just the living areas, and that the pool is the size the photos suggest.
The hills behind Cannes are steep and the lanes are narrow, so a large vehicle struggles on some La Californie and Super Cannes approaches, and the Festival turns the seafront and the Croisette into gridlock for the fortnight. A car with a driver is the norm at the top of the market, and a helicopter transfer from Nice, about seven minutes, is common over the Festival. Book the villa, the chef, and the marquee restaurant tables a year ahead for the Festival, and by the previous autumn for July and August, because the staffed hillside inventory closes first.
From about €8,000 per week for a three-bedroom in low season to €350,000 or more for a large staffed estate over the Film Festival. Most quality four-bedrooms in the hills land between €25,000 and €45,000 per week in shoulder season and €42,000 to €85,000 in July, August, and the Festival fortnight.
The Cannes Film Festival is the single apex. The 79th edition ran 12 to 23 May 2026, and villa rates over that fortnight run two to three times the July baseline, with the best properties booked a year ahead. July and August are the second peak, followed by the Cannes Lions advertising festival in June.
France applies a reduced 10 percent VAT to professionally managed and serviced accommodation. On top of the rate, Cannes charges a taxe de séjour: for unclassified furnished rentals it is 5 percent of the per-person, per-night price excluding tax, capped at about €5.36 per person per night in 2026 including the regional rail levy, per the Mairie de Cannes 2026 schedule.
Budget the 10 percent VAT where it applies, the Cannes taxe de séjour per person per night, an end-of-stay cleaning charge of €500 to €2,000, a refundable deposit, and any staff. A private chef on the Riviera runs about €350 to €600 per day plus food, above the Italian equivalent.
Most luxury villas sit in the hills of La Californie, Super Cannes, or toward Mougins, a 30 to 40 minute drive from Nice Côte d’Azur airport (NCE), the second-busiest airport in France. A helicopter transfer from Nice to Cannes runs about seven minutes and is common at the top of the market over the Festival.
Cannes sits at the top of the French Riviera with Cap d’Antibes and Saint-Tropez. The Film Festival fortnight makes Cannes the single most expensive villa week on the coast, but in July and August a comparable villa in Cannes runs close to Saint-Tropez and below the largest Cap d’Antibes estates.
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