With the average life that stretches, there are more and more retirees who sell the home using this type of contract. A way to collect a capital to spend while continuing to live in your home
It is a “save crisis” as few remain. It also represents a sort of bridge between generations, it agrees elderly and young people, offering advantages to both. The “bare property” is perhaps still the only happy island of the real estate market, the only one that allows a safe profitable investment. The brick, crushed by taxes and penalized by a legislation that does not protect the owners, leaving them at the mercy of the arrears, has long stopped being the piggy bank. Even what was supposed to be the easy and remunerative business of tourist rentals, the holiday homes, is revealing full of unpleasant surprises and unknowns: apartments that remain empty for long periods, star management costs and the arrival of restrictive municipal measures. Not to mention that, from here, the owners will have to get in compliance with the energy efficiency requirements imposed by Brussels. And they will be trouble for the wallet.
Such a mix of factors explains why most of the sale – this is what experts in the sector support – is represented above all from first homes, the house you buy to put on a family and not as an investment. There is an exception, or “the high end”, but this is another matter.
The bare property, however, is still an interesting marketfavored by two specificities: the lengthening of life expectancy, low pensions that must be rounded with extra revenue and the low purchasing power of the salaries of young people. Here the needs of the two generations are perfectly fitted. The average age has risen and more and more the ultra-60s who continue to have an active life, made of relationships, interests, travels.
All activities that cost and for which the pension may not be sufficient. Also because, after a life of sacrifices, between work and children, you would like to pull your breath and practice a little legitimate selfishness, thinking about your well -being. Not only that. Pensions are increasingly lean, the health services provided by the public system decreasing and so, to have a dignified life, additional revenues are sought.
The house sold in bare property, therefore, responds well to this life project. Just as it is an answer to the question of the home of young people who, despite not having great financial resources, want to plan the future. This particular sale formula has the advantage for those who sell, to continue to live in the apartment and to collect the capital. Those who buy, on the other hand, buy a property at a lower price than the market price, with a “discount” which is linked to the age of the owner. The house is doubled: both for the increase in the value of the property over the years, and thanks to the advancement of the age of the usufructuary.
However, it should be borne in mind that it is an investment with a high uncertainty rate on the possibility of taking advantage of the good in a short time. As for the expenses, except for different agreements, the condominium and ordinary maintenance are borne by the usufructory, while the extraordinary ones are borne by the buyer. All taxes concerning possession (IRPEF, IMU and Waste) compete with the elderly who continues to live there.
The convenience of the price and the advantages for the one and the other party explain the constant increase, in recent years, of this type of sale. According to an analysis of suits, in 2024 20 percent rose, compared to the previous year, involving 97 thousand pensioners.
Bologna records the most significant increase, With +36 percent, followed by Rome +33.5 percent, Turin +32 percent and Milan +30.9 percent. Florence and Genoa also show very important growth percentages, respectively 29.8 and 28 percent.
The “trend” on the rise not only affects the big cities. Medium -sized centers have significant percentages, such as Padua (+26.4 percent), Venice (+26 percent) and Naples (+23.8 percent), while South City such as Catania, Palermo and Cagliari report more contained but in any case indicative of the dynamism of the sector, with percentages ranging from 21.7 to 23 percent. On average, the sellers are about 75 years old and receive pensions just exceeding 1,100 euros per month. A fact that shows how the house, even in the third age, can represent a useful investment.
Emilia-Romagna leads the national ranking, representing 39 percent of overall sales in bare ownership. Lazio follow 18 percent, Piedmont and Lombardy 16 percent, Tuscany 10 percent and Liguria 8 percent.
The most requested types are three-room apartments and two-room apartments, but there is also a growing question for independent and semi-independent properties.
The analysis of confability shows that the sale in bare property is also becoming an increasingly interesting option For buyers in the age group 45-54 years, often parents interested in ensuring a future investment for children or to guarantee supplementary economic security for retirement.
For Alberto Zanni, national president of Confabitare, the growing use of the sale bare property is the sign of “a crisis that continues to hit the elderly of the population hard”.
Gualtiero Tamburini, economist and Senior Advisor of the Nomisma Study Center, adds some other inspiration for reflection. «In addition to aging, the population also makes fewer children. Not having to be inherited the property, and having to face the needs of health, the elderly person is induced to also income the apartment in which he lives. Of course, there are also those who do it to indulge in some more luxury in the last part of life, those extra expenses they have deprived themselves of young people; However, the search for economic security especially regarding health is predominant. Until twenty years ago, the sale of bare ownership were a rarity ». Tamburini then stresses that “the real estate investment continues to be appreciated by the Italians, despite the high taxation and the difficulties in drawing an income. It is still seen as a way to accumulate savings without resorting to a life insurance or a pension fund, two tools with which Italians are not great familiar ».
In a moment of crisis, a parent’s house also becomes a resource to help children In difficulty, with precarious work, a divorce behind, or unemployed. Here, therefore, that selling the walls guarantees that useful additional entrance, when not decisive, to make ends meet a family budget.
