Registering a lease in Trieste: costs and deadlines

A residential lease must be registered with the Agenzia delle Entrate, the Italian tax agency, within 30 days of signing, or of the start date if that comes first, whatever the rent. Under the cedolare secca (flat-rate rental tax) you pay neither registration tax nor stamp duty; without it, you pay 2% of the annual rent, with a minimum of €67 in the first year. The other deadlines, from the APE to the Questura, are in the calendar below.

The owner's calendar: when, what, who

• From the start of negotiations to signing

  What: APE made available, then handed over; the APE clause in the lease

  Who: landlord

• Before choosing the cedolare

  What: registered letter (raccomandata) to the tenant waiving any rent update, ISTAT included

  Who: landlord

• Within 48 hours of handing over the home

  What: written notice to the Questura or the local police station (Commissariato), if the tenant is not an EU citizen

  Who: landlord

• Within 30 days of signing, or of the start date if earlier

  What: registration with the RLI form and payment, or choice of the cedolare

  Who: landlord

• Regulated rent not assisted, after signing

  What: request for the certificate of compliance (attestazione di rispondenza)

  Who: the party concerned

• Within 60 days of registration

  What: documented notice of the registration to the tenant and to the building manager (amministratore)

  Who: landlord

• Regulated rent: for changes in 2026, by 30/06/2027

  What: ILIA declaration to Esatto SPA, with lease and certificate

  Who: landlord

• Every year, within 30 days of the end of each year of the lease

  What: registration tax for the year (code 1501), if you pay year by year and are not under the cedolare; choosing or revoking the cedolare

  Who: the parties, cost split in half (registration tax); landlord (cedolare)

• Within 30 days of an extension, assignment or termination

  What: RLI form and payment: extension 2% (1504), assignment without consideration €67 (1502), early termination €67 (1503)

  Who: the parties

If you register online you pay by direct debit from your account; at the office you can also use the F24 Elementi identificativi form, code 1500 for the first registration. Under the cedolare, extensions and terminations pay no tax but must be notified within 30 days; an assignment pays registration tax even under the cedolare.

An extension that was not notified does not cost you the cedolare, as long as you kept paying it and declaring it. The registered letter, on the other hand, is a condition: without it, the option has no effect. It is not needed if the waiver of updates is already written into the lease.

What does it cost to register a 3+2 regulated rent lease and a 4+4 free-market lease?

Without the cedolare you pay registration tax of 2% on the annual rent, minimum €67 for the first year, plus stamp duty: €16 for every 4 pages, and in any case every 100 lines, for each copy. By law the registration tax is split in half; in the ministerial regulated rent models the stamp duty is the tenant's. Trieste is one of the high housing pressure municipalities (alta tensione abitativa): for the 3+2 and the student lease the base falls to 70%, but not for the temporary lease.

Example. Assumptions: an 8-page lease of no more than 25 lines per page, registered in one copy; a 3+2 regulated rent lease at €650 a month, a 4+4 free-market lease at €750.

• 3+2 regulated rent€7,8004+4 free market€9,000

  Annual rent

• 3+2 regulated rent70% = €5,4604+4 free market€9,000

  Tax base

• 3+2 regulated rent€109.004+4 free market€180.00

  Registration tax, first year (2%, rounded to the euro)

• 3+2 regulated rent€32.004+4 free market€32.00

  Stamp duty (2 × €16)

• 3+2 regulated rent€141.004+4 free market€212.00

  Total at registration

• 3+2 regulated rent€109.004+4 free market€180.00

  Each following year, with no ISTAT update (code 1501)

• 3+2 regulated rent€04+4 free market€0

  Under the cedolare (registration and stamp)

You can also pay for the whole term at once: the tax then drops by half the legal interest rate for each year. Under the cedolare you save registration tax and stamp duty, but you pay the cedolare itself: €780 a year on the regulated rent lease (10%), €1,890 on the free-market one (21%).

Registering late: what does it cost?

If you never register, you are fined 120% of the tax due, with a minimum of €250. If you register up to 30 days late, it falls to 45%, with a minimum of €150. Resolution 56/E of 13/10/2025 from the Agenzia delle Entrate adds two rules:

• if you pay year by year, the penalty is calculated on the tax for the first year, not on the whole term;
• under the cedolare, where there is no tax, the fixed minimum penalty remains: €150 for up to 30 days' delay, €250 beyond that.

Later years paid late carry a different penalty, the one for late payment. If you meet the conditions, voluntary correction (ravvedimento operoso) reduces the penalty.

The APE: what must you give the tenant?

The energy performance certificate (attestato di prestazione energetica) must be available to the tenant as soon as negotiations begin and be handed over when they end; if the home has none, the landlord must have one drawn up. The lease must contain a clause in which the tenant states they have received the information and the certificate; for a single flat, the copy is not attached.

Without the clause, the parties pay jointly and in equal shares from €1,000 to €4,000, half that if the lease is for no more than 3 years. Without the APE, the landlord faces €300 to €1,800.

Questura: who must be told?

• Italian or EU tenant: registration absorbs the notice of transfer of a building (cessione di fabbricato).
• Non-EU or stateless tenant: written notice to the public security authority (Questura or Commissariato) within 48 hours, even if the lease is registered. Skipping it can cost €500 to €3,500.

Regulated rent in Trieste: certificate and Esatto SPA

If you sign a regulated rent lease without the assistance of the organisations, the 10% cedolare and the IRPEF and registration tax breaks require a certificate from an organisation that signed the agreement (Resolution 31/E of 2018). Under the 2025 agreement the certificate is valid only with a qualified digital signature.

Then there is the ILIA, which has replaced IMU in our region: to have it cut to 75%, you file the declaration with Esatto SPA, with the lease and the certificate. For changes in 2026 the deadline is 30/06/2027; the declaration also holds for later years if the data do not change. Which agreement to choose is explained in the regulated rent guide.

And if the lease is not registered?

It is void: paragraph 346 of Law 311/2004 says so. The tenant can ask the court to bring it back to a 4+4 or a 3+2: the court sets a rent no higher than the minimum value defined under article 2 of Law 431/1998 and orders the refund of anything paid in excess.

For tax purposes, unless proven otherwise, the lease is presumed to have existed in the 4 tax years before the one in which it is assessed, at a rent equal to 10% of the property's value.