Selling a property in Morocco and moving the money out: what the Office des Changes actually requires

Foreign buyers spend months preparing a purchase in Marrakech: neighbourhood, price per square metre, land title, notary. Almost nobody prepares the exit. Yet that is where the most expensive surprise happens — selling, paying the tax, then discovering the bank cannot send the money abroad because there is no proof of how the property was originally funded. Moroccan exchange regulations are explicit on this point, and the outcome is decided at purchase, not at resale.

The retransfer guarantee: decided on the day you buy

One principle governs the whole subject: what came into Morocco in foreign currency can leave Morocco — provided you can prove it came in.

Article 763 of the General Instruction on Foreign Exchange Operations defines foreign investments as those made in foreign currency by foreign individuals or companies, resident or not, and by Moroccans living abroad. These investments benefit from a convertibility regime guaranteeing three freedoms: carrying out the investment in Morocco, transferring the income it produces, and transferring the proceeds of its liquidation or sale.

Article 764 explicitly lists the acquisition of real estate, or of usage rights attached to it, among the recognised forms of foreign investment, alongside self-funded construction work. Buying a riad in the medina or an apartment in Guéliz with imported currency is therefore not a simple purchase: it is a foreign investment, with the exit regime that comes with it.

The six-month report, the omission that costs the most

Article 766 requires foreign investors, including Moroccans living abroad, to send the Office des Changes — directly or through their bank, notary, trustee or lawyer — a report within six months of completing the investment. It sets out the investor’s identity, nationality and place of residence, along with the sector, amount and form of the investment.

For real estate, three supporting documents are required: copies of the acquisition contracts, a statement of expenditure with the corresponding invoices, and the bank forms (2, 3 or 4) or certificates evidencing funding in foreign currency, in convertible dirhams, or by debit of a forward convertible account.

This is the file almost nobody assembles at purchase, and the one the bank asks for ten years later at the sale. Putting it together takes an hour at signing; reconstructing it a decade on, from a bank that has since changed its systems, can take months.

What the transfer actually covers: capital and capital gain

Article 767 authorises approved intermediaries to transfer the proceeds of the sale or liquidation of an investment to the investor. The text specifies that the transfer must cover the nominal value of the investment “as well as any capital gain”, with the sale proceeds corresponding to the real value of the asset sold.

The key point: the regulation does not cap the exit at the amount originally imported. If the property has gained value, that gain is transferable — provided the price stated in the deed matches the property’s real value.

The price on the deed is therefore doubly structural: under-declaring to reduce tax also reduces, by the same amount, what the bank can lawfully transfer. This extends the rules covered in our guide to traceable payments in a Moroccan property purchase.

The documents that unlock the transfer

Article 769 lists the documents to be presented in support of the transfer order. The common base: any document evidencing the foreign-currency funding of the investment, or a copy of the acknowledgement of receipt of the report sent to the Office des Changes. For real estate, two further items are required:

• a copy of the sale deed;
• the documents evidencing payment of the taxes and duties owed on the transaction.

That second item imposes a sequence: tax first, transfer second. The sale triggers income tax on the property gain, levied at 20% of the net profit with a minimum contribution of 3% of the sale price, to be declared within 30 days — the calculation and exemptions are detailed in our guide to the property profit tax in Morocco. Until that side is settled and documented, the transfer file is incomplete. Article 770 also requires the bank to send the Office des Changes an electronic report on the execution of the transfer: the operation is traced from both ends.

What if the purchase was not funded in foreign currency?

This is a common situation: an inherited property, an older purchase funded in locally sourced dirhams, or a contribution whose banking trail no longer exists. Article 768 addresses it without ambiguity. The sale itself remains free — a foreign owner may sell a Moroccan property whatever its original funding. But if the asset sold does not benefit from the convertibility regime, the dirham proceeds are made available to the seller if they reside in Morocco, or credited to a forward convertible account, once payment of the taxes, duties and fees on the transaction has been evidenced.

That account is not a transfer: it is an intermediate regime with its own operating conditions, to be clarified with the bank. The gap between “sellable” and “transferable” is very real.

The same article adds that where the buyer is a non-resident foreigner paying in dirhams in Morocco, those dirhams must come from currency sold on the exchange market, from a foreign currency account, or from a convertible dirham account — in line with the rules described in our analysis of mortgages for foreign buyers and Moroccans abroad.

What IGOC 2026 changed, and one point to watch

A new General Instruction on Foreign Exchange Operations came into force on 1 January 2026, replacing the 2024 version. According to Médias24, it raises several ceilings and introduces a provision of direct interest to foreign owners settled in Morocco: long-term foreign residents holding investments made in foreign currency for at least ten years may now transfer their investment income abroad, up to 2 million dirhams per year, even without documentary proof of the original funding.

Note the exact scope: this flexibility covers investment income — rent, for example — and not the proceeds of selling the property itself, which remain subject to the evidence rules described above.

Finally, a word on numbering. As of 2 September 2026, the “MRE” pages of the Office des Changes website still published the text of articles 763 to 771 with reference to IGOC 2013, while specialist firms now place the foreign investment convertibility regime at articles 170 to 177 of IGOC 2026. The substance is stable; the article reference to cite in a bank file should be confirmed with the bank or the Office des Changes before filing.

Checklist for a non-resident seller

• Retrieve the original acquisition deed and the price stated on it
• Gather the evidence that currency entered Morocco: international transfer orders, bank forms (2, 3 or 4), certificates, statements from the convertible dirham account
• Check whether the six-month report was actually filed after the purchase, and retrieve the acknowledgement of receipt
• Ask the bank, before listing the property, for the exact list of documents in its transfer file
• Declare and pay income tax on the property gain within 30 days of the sale, and keep the payment receipts
• Make sure the price on the deed matches the property’s real value
• Where foreign-currency funding cannot be documented, have the bank set out the terms of the forward convertible account

The bottom line

Repatriating the proceeds of a Moroccan property sale is not an obstacle in itself: the regulation explicitly provides for transferring both capital and capital gain on an investment funded in foreign currency. It becomes an obstacle when the evidence is missing. A buyer who, from the day of signing, insists that their notary and bank issue the foreign-currency funding forms and files the report within six months avoids the only real difficulty of the exit. It is worth building that step into the buying process, alongside checking the land title.