I own a property in Italy, can I rent it out?

You may have a property in Italy, or may be thinking to buy one in Italy as an investment, and may be wondering if you can rent it out while you don’t use it, to pay the bills.
The answer is: yes, you can rent it out. In this article we refer to long term contracts; we briefly talked about short term rentals in one of our past newsletters.

You can rent it out if you are resident abroad, if you are a non-EU citizen, all that is irrelevant.

“Long term contracts” means contracts of at least 31+ days (contratto transitorio, contratto 4+4, contratto 3+2).

You don’t need any authorization to rent out your property long term; of course, the property must be a residential property, ideally it must have the certificate of “agibilita`” and you can’t, for example, convert a garage into a home and rent it out, if you haven’t obtained the required permissions for the conversion, and if the property isn’t qualified as “residential property”.

You can market your property privately or through an agency; if you will use an agency, be aware that you, the landlord, will have to pay a commission to the agency, which usually is one month rental or 10% of one year rental, plus vat.
In any case, make sure that the rental contract is properly drafted, and that the conditions are clear for both parties; in this regard you may want to consult a lawyer.

The contract must be registered at the Agenzia delle Entrate, and you need to pay tax in Italy on the associated income.

During the rental, the landlord is still responsible for the extraordinary maintenance of the property, so, if you live far away, you may want to use a local property manager to deal with this kind of things.
Lastly, the landlord is still responsible for the IMU on this property, while the TaRi (waste tax) is on the tenant.

This article is not exhaustive and is a guidance only.

If you need assistance with renting a property, please do not hesitate to get in touch.

Barbara De Benedittis Relocation and Legal in Italy