FAAQ

Frequently Asked Abruzzo Questions

You are all welcome to ask me questions regarding the purchase of property in Abruzzo or Italy. I shall publish questions and answers on this page.

Q: Hi Gianpiero, please can you list the taxes and charges applicable when buying property in Italy?
A: The fees and tax applied by a notary when purchasing a property in Italy are the following:

- House tax
- Land tax (applicable if some land is included in the sale)
- Government stamp tax (bollo forfettizzato)
- Ownership transfer tax (voltura)
- Archives tax (tassa archivio)
- National notary tax (tassa nazionale notariato)
- Notary fee (onorario notarile)
- Property certificates (visure)
- VAT tax (IVA)

House tax, land tax, notary fee and V.A.T. (IVA) are the four main charges. The rest is nothing to worry about.

Q: What is the tax relief on purchasing a home in Italy?
A: For those who get a residence status in Italy and buy a house, in order to benefit of the tax relief the law states that:

1) The house must not belong to the luxury homes category.

2) The house must be situated in the municipality (Comune) where the buyer either resides or works, or where the buyer will reside or work within 18 months from the purchase date. It is not required any longer (as a previous law said) that the house must be the main home of the buyer.

3) The buyer, to be eligible of the prima casa tax relief benefits, must not be the owner, exclusively or together with his/her partner) of another home or part of a property in the same municipality nor must be owning another property anywhere in Italy previously bought with the prima casa tax relief benefits.

4) If the seller is a private citizen, the registration tax will be applied in the measure of 3% instead of 7%) of the declared value of the property and the "imposta catastale and ipotecaria" taxes will be applied in the measure of 168,00 euros each.

5) If the seller is a company, the VAT (IVA) will be applied in the measure of 4% (instead of 10%) of the declared value of the property and the "imposta di registro, imposta catastale and ipotecaria" taxes will be applied in the measure of 168,00 euros each.

6) The prima casa cannot be sold before 5 years from the purchase date and if this happens the buyer has the obligation to buy another house within 12 months, which this time must be the main home of the buyer. Otherwise there is a charge to pay back.

The Tax Office has a timespan of 3 years to check that you were entitled to the benefits of a prima casa purchase.

The 3 years period starts from:
a) the Rogito (purchase) date, if they have reasons to believe that declarations of eligibility to the benefits were false;
b) from the end of the 18 months period above mentioned, if at the moment you bought your residenza or work was still somewhere else;
c) from the date you change your residenza the second time because you sold your prima casa, before 5 years have gone by and you never moved your residenza to another house within 12 months.

Q: What is a visura catastale?
A: In Italy there is a system of land and house registration called Catasto. A visura catastale is therefore a document issued by the Catasto containing some important technical and financial data concerning each registered property. Getting a visura is usually the first step in checking a property profile.

Everybody can get a visura from the Catasto office or from many Internet outlets (I often use CERTITEL, on the italian post office website, they send you the visura by email or by post).

There are different kinds of visura:

1) visura per immobile sintetica: it shows data from the classification of the land, i.e. quality, class, surface, R.D. (reddito dominicale) and R.A. (reddito agrario), where reddito means income;

2) visura per immobile completa: it shows data as in 1) plus:
- rights on property shared with other plots;
- number of the "partita" they belong to;
- list of exhisting and suppressed property

3) visura per immobile storica: it shows the history of the objective features and ownership rights;

4) visura per soggetto: it shows data of land and/or buildings;

You can ask for a visura by using two main types of query:

query 1: visura per immobile (ricerca puntuale) if you know the catasto identification parameters of the property, i.e.:
Comune + foglio di mappa + numero di particella (+ subalterno se fabbricato);
(in english: municipality + map sheet number + plot number (+ sub number if it's a building).

query 2: visura per soggetto (ricerca personale) if you know the name, place of birth, date of birth and tax code (codice fiscale) of the owner.

It looks all a bit complicated, but after the first visura, all the others are easy to understand, but normally it is part of my job anyway to cope with the paperwork, so you do not have to worry about it. Please bear in mind that a visura does not certify the ownership of a property, although the owner/owners name/s are on it. Ownership is certified only by U.P.I. (Ufficio Pubblicità Immobiliare), once called Conservatoria dei Registri, which is where all public acts on property are registered.