What to do With Your Italian Investment Property

Having decided that you want to use Italian property as an investment asset how can you profit from it?

Having decided that you want to invest in a property in Italy and make an income for yourself from the rental of that property, how exactly can you turn your plans into a reality?

In this article we take you through the realisation of a property investment strategy in Italy from start to finish so that you can find out what to do with your Italian investment property to make the most money from it.

First things first you have to pick the location in which you think there will be strong rental interest. 

If you’re going to be concentrating on a jet to let, tourism rental based strategy where you rent your home for a week or two weeks at a time you might want to pick a seaside location and select an apartment on a complex with pool etc., or if your budget is slightly larger you could pick a villa in a relatively rural, but beautiful and desirable location which comes with its own pool. 

If on the other hand you want to rent to the corporate market you will be better off looking at city based locations and choosing well located one or two bedroom apartment units, finished to a high specification.  Think Rome for example or Milan perhaps…basically where there is a high concentration of employment and therefore demand from professionals for accommodation.

Once you have an idea of the rental market that you want to tap into and the location in which you will be buying you have to set yourself a realistic budget.  To do so you need to spend some time examining the market in your location, the types of property available there, average prices for those types of property and then you can get an idea of how much you will need to spend to get the rental unit that you want.

With a price in mind you need to look at your finances.  If you need a mortgage to finance the property in Italy you can either speak to a local lender, a mortgage lender in the UK like Barclays who lend on Italian property, or you could consider re-mortgaging your home in the UK if you have significant equity rolled up in it.  Your choices will be dictated by your personal circumstances and you should take personalised advice before committing to one approach or another.

Having spoken to a mortgage lender of your choice and had a mortgage agreed in principle, you can then begin to look more closely at the market and select a property that fits your requirements and one that matches your budget.  At this point you need to be very careful – you need to remember that ultimately you are buying an investment property in Italy you are not buying a house for yourself.  So, you have to think about what your tenants will want from the home, not necessarily what you want from the property!

Keeping this fact in mind you will likely find an ideal property and you can make an offer on it.  Thanks to recent taxation reforms in Italy it is now less expensive to purchase real estate, however, you should ask your chosen lawyer and estate agent up front about the likely fees and charges you will incur in addition to the purchase price.

Details of the property buying process in Italy are available in an article entitled ‘Italy: Buying Property and How it Works’ on Amberlamb.

Having reached the stage at which you have an investment property in Italy ready to rent you need to find a way of marketing your property.  One of the ways those who have jet to let real estate in Italy find effective is choosing a multiple listing website like Authentic Italy which has lists of Italy apartments and Italian holiday villas and apartments to rent all over Italy including Tuscany, Sicily and Sardinia.  As an alternative you can find a local letting agent who specialises either in holiday lets in the most popular resort locations, or one dealing in corporate letting in the main Italian cities.

You can also set up your own website with details of the property and your contact details and you can use google’s pay per click advertising method to get your site seen straight away.

Finally, buying an investment property in Italy that you rent out for immediate income also provides you with a capital appreciating asset that you can hopefully one day resell and realise a profit on.