Pre-emption Rights: Who May Have the First Right to Buy

The price is agreed, the date with the notary is pencilled in, and the buyer is already imagining the first summer. Italian law allows for one more reader of the story, someone who is not at the table and who may be entitled to step into the buyer’s place.

Who can buy a property before you do?

The right has a name, prelazione, pre-emption. It is a statutory right to be preferred as buyer when the owner decides to sell, on the same terms as those agreed with a third party. It is comparable in concept to a right of first refusal in US and UK practice, but here the law itself, not a contract, creates the right. The table sets out each holder, the property concerned and how long the holder has.

Redemption, riscatto, is the holder’s right to take the property from the buyer, on the terms of the sale, when the procedure was not followed. The owner’s written notice of the proposed sale is the denuntiatio. The rules quoted are those of the consolidated texts when the article was last reviewed, and whether a right applies to a given sale turns on the facts. What follows takes the holders in turn, starting with the land.

What happens when farmland is sold?

Two persons can hold the right when rural land is sold, and the tenant comes first.

The tenant

When a rural holding let to direct cultivators, on a sharecropping, part-tenancy or similar arrangement, is sold for consideration, the tenant is entitled to buy on the same terms if certain conditions are met. Seasonal arrangements are excepted. The tenant must have cultivated the land for at least four years under the 1965 law, a period that a 1971 law reduced to two.^[11][12] The tenant must not have sold other rural land of taxable land income above a low statutory threshold in the previous two years, except to consolidate holdings. And the land, with any other land the tenant owns, must not exceed three times the area that matches the working capacity of the tenant’s family.^[11]

The neighbour

The right also belongs to a direct cultivator who owns land adjoining the holding and, since a 2016 law, to an IAP registered in the agricultural social-security scheme.^[2][13] In both cases it applies only if no sharecropper, tenant or similar who is a direct cultivator is settled on the land offered for sale. The right of the neighbour is therefore secondary to that of a tenant on the land.^[2]

Where there are several neighbours, a 2024 law prefers young agricultural enterprises and young farmers, in that order and, on equal terms, the one with adequate knowledge and skills.^[14] An enterprise counts as young if its holder is over 18 and under 41; in a partnership or cooperative, if at least half of the partners are such persons; in a company, if at least half of the capital is subscribed by such persons and at least half of the board is made up of them.^[14] The same law repealed a provision that had set an earlier order of preference.^[14] The right also extends to certain agricultural cooperatives and partnerships in which at least half of the members or directors are direct cultivators.^[15]

When the right does not apply

Pre-emption is not allowed on an exchange, a forced sale, a liquidation or bankruptcy sale, or an expropriation for public purposes. Nor is it allowed where the land is designated by a town plan, even one not yet approved, for building, industrial or tourist use.^[1]

The procedure

The owner must notify the holder by registered letter, sending the preliminary contract. The contract must name the buyer, the price and the other terms, including the clause for the case of pre-emption. The holder has 30 days to exercise the right. If the right is exercised, the price must be paid within six months, running from the thirtieth day after the owner’s notification, unless the parties agree otherwise.^[1]

If the owner does not notify, or states a price higher than the price in the sale contract, the holder may redeem the land from the buyer, and from any later successor, within one year of the transcription of the sale contract.^[1] In 2026, as legal publishers report, the Court of Cassation ruled that redemption is not available to an owner who bought the neighbouring land after the preliminary contract was signed, because the conditions for pre-emption must exist when the transaction begins.^[16]

Notarial commentaries add that the holder can waive the right in writing, after knowing the terms of the sale, and that a waiver can be received by the notary on the day of the deed.^[17] Otherwise the deed follows the expiry of the 30 days. For the parcels, tenancies and neighbours that make up the position on a rural estate, see “Buying a Vineyard Estate”.

When can the State buy first?

The State’s right applies to property covered by the Code of Cultural Heritage and Landscape. The sections below follow the property, the report and its periods, and the part played by regions and local bodies.

What counts as cultural property?

Property owned by public bodies and private non-profit bodies that is of artistic, historical, archaeological or ethno-anthropological interest is cultural property.^[3] Property of private owners becomes cultural property when the Ministry has made a declaration to that effect.^[18] The declaration is notified to the owner and, for property recorded in the registers, is transcribed there at the request of the soprintendente, the head of the local office of the Ministry of Culture.^[19] It is effective against every later owner.^[19]

The Code’s list of things that can qualify includes villas, parks and gardens of artistic or historical interest and rural architecture of historical or ethno-anthropological interest.^[20] Property of public bodies and private non-profit bodies that is more than 70 years old and by an author no longer living is subject to the Code until the Ministry has verified whether it has such interest.^[21]

How do the report and the periods work?

Any act that transfers ownership of cultural property, in whole or in part, must be reported to the Ministry through the soprintendente of the place where it stands.^[4] The report must contain the identification of the parties and of the property, its location, the nature and conditions of the act and the parties’ address in Italy. A report missing these details is treated as not made.^[4]

The Ministry, or, where the Code provides, the region or another local public body, may buy the property at the price stated in the act of sale, or at the value stated in an act of contribution to a company.^[22] It must decide within 60 days of receiving the report.^[5] If the report is omitted, late or incomplete, the period is 180 days from the moment the Ministry receives the missing elements.^[5]

The pre-emption is notified to the seller and the buyer within the period, and ownership passes to the State on the date of the last notification. While the 60-day period runs, the sale is subject to a suspensive condition, meaning that it does not take effect until the period ends without exercise, and the seller may not deliver the property. The clauses of the sale contract do not bind the State. If the right is exercised over only part of the items sold, the buyer may withdraw.^[5]

What about regions and local bodies?

On receiving the report, the soprintendente informs the region and the local public bodies concerned. Within 20 days of the report they may propose to the Ministry that it exercise the right, with a resolution that provides the financial cover and states the cultural purpose. The Ministry may waive its right and transfer it to the body concerned within 20 days of the report. That body must then notify the seller and the buyer within 60 days of the report.^[23] Where the report was omitted, late or incomplete, these periods are extended to 90, 120 and 180 days.^[23]

Where a property is sold together with others for a single price, is given in exchange or is transferred without a money price, the value is set by the body that exercises the right, and if the seller does not accept it, by a third party.^[24] The basics of the State’s right and its link with works on listed buildings are in “Buying in a Historic Centre”.

Does a tenant or a co-heir have a right to buy?

Both can, in defined cases. The periods are short in both.

Commercial and professional leases

If the owner of a property let under the rules for commercial and professional leases intends to sell it for consideration, the owner must notify the tenant by a document served by a bailiff.^[7] The document states the price in money, the other conditions and an invitation to exercise the right.^[7] The tenant has 60 days to reply by a served document offering equal terms, and payment is due within 30 days from the sixtieth day after the owner’s notification.^[7] The rule does not apply to sales between co-heirs or to transfers to a spouse or to relatives up to the second degree.^[7]

If the owner does not notify, or states a higher price than the one in the sale, the tenant may redeem the property within six months of the transcription of the contract.^[7] These rules apply to leases for industrial, commercial, artisan and tourist-related activities, self-employed professional activity and hotels, and not to short-term leases.^[6]

Residential leases

The residential tenant’s right is narrower. At the first expiry of a lease under the ordinary rules of Law 431/1998, the landlord may refuse renewal, with six months’ notice, if the landlord intends to sell the dwelling to third parties and owns no other residential property except the one used as the landlord’s own home.^[8] In that case the tenant has a right of pre-emption, exercised in the manner set out for commercial leases.^[8][9]

Co-heirs

A co-heir who wishes to sell a share of an inheritance to a person who is not a co-heir must notify the proposal, with the price, to the other co-heirs.^[10] They have two months from the last notification to exercise the right.^[10] If there was no notification, they may redeem the share from the buyer and from any later successor, for as long as the inheritance co-ownership lasts.^[10] See also “Who Inherits the House”.

What do these rights have in common?

Each right lets the holder take the place of the buyer on the terms already agreed, which is why the price and terms are notified. The periods are short, 30 days, 60 days, two months, but an omitted or incomplete notice can extend them, or give rise to redemption for a period of six months to one year after transcription or, for co-heirs, as long as the co-ownership lasts.

The rights do not depend on the buyer’s nationality or residence. They depend on what is being sold and on who farms, rents, co-owns or is entitled to protect it.

Whether a right exists is found in the property’s documents, namely the tenancy contracts, the declaration of cultural interest if any, and the title deeds, not on a viewing. The other checks that belong with these are in “Due Diligence: What Sinks a Purchase”.