Land purchase taxes and charges

If you have decided to buy why do you need a geometra? The seller has to provide certain documentation, a current Certificate di Destinazione urbanistica, which shows what you can do with the land, and whether it has vincoli. He must provide the atto di precedenza and you should ask him for the visure so at least you can see if he is the legal owner. If its just land with no building on it, you will be paying 18% of the price paid as tax, plus 168 euros, plus registration/transcription of the atto - depends on the notaio but usually about 300, plus the notiaos fees which will be within a band - between 1680 and 2420 euros. Because its just land it makes no difference whether you are resident or not - its land, so it cant be your prima casa.

Ram - We were not sure exactly what fees should be involved, so thought that we should put down all the details to save anybody having to ask any extra questions. We have since realised that we forgot to mention that a very small part of the total sq metres is classified as fabbr. rurale, although there is nothing to see there now (it is a little bit overgrown). Presumably this small part should incur lower purchase fees, but will have stamp duty on it? The scrittura privata that we have been sent, and been signed by the vendors does state the destinazione zona urbanistica as E/2 (zona agricolo). It also confirms that they have received the land by virtue of inheritance. There is also a paragraph included which says that the vendors guarantee full and exclusive ownership of the property for sale and that it is free from tax liens, vincoli and rights of way of third parties. We were given a copy of the visure when we looked first looked at the land. Many thanks for your quick reply. John & Toni

That'a lot of money, how much land are you getting for that? Not being nosey but... according to my paper work we paid around 10000 euro for just under 10000m2 -plus the cost of the house)

Bunterboy - we have done our homework over the last six years and have looked at other areas of Italy which do work out much cheaper, but always come back to Santa Marina and realise that we love that the best. We notice that you are over on the east side of Italy and perhaps that is priced differently too. We are happy with the price that we are paying for the amount of land that we are getting and where the location is which includes a beautiful coastal view. We plan on living there one day and therefore it has got to be right. Noddy - Good luck with your search for your perfect piece of land. Hope you are not too impatient, because as you can see it has taken us six years, but we have learnt quite a bit along the way!

We're just considering buying a piece of land too, so this thread will be very interesting to us. Does anybody know the ongoing costs too, of owning a piece of agro land?

I'd like a sea view. Sigh.

How easy is it to get planning permission on land classified as 'agricolo'? Around us it is nigh on impossible. Good luck with the purchase.

OK - a few points: 1. You dont say how much land you are buying, which has everything to do with whether you can build there one day. 2. It is now not posssible to sell a fabbricato rurale. it must be reaccatastoed before the sale. If you want it as a house then you will pay 7+2+1% tax on it as a second home. if it is just a pile of stones you can catasto it as an ente urbano which has no tax, but doesnt mean it can necessarily be a house one day. This is your vendors job. 3. just because the vendor has said the land is clean, doesnt mean it is. You will need the notaio to do visure ipotecarie, and other searches. You must do the checks for prelazione by the neighbours. 4. Has the land got clear access. Is there electricity and /or water. ? If you want to build there, you need to know whether it is feasible to bring electricity - you have no automatic right to cross other peoples land. 5. The seller must produce acertificato di destinazione urbanistica or you will not know whether you have a piece of land you can do nothing with.

Hi Ram Hope you don't mind but we have PM'd you on these points. John & Toni

It all depends where it is. National law allows building on agricultural land. Regional and Provincial law may not. In Tuscany, for example, it is virtually impossible. In other zones there is no problem.