Buyers from the United States, the UK, Ireland, Canada or Australia treat the Italian closing as the decisive moment. It is not. By the time you reach the notary, price, conditions and exposure are settled — in two earlier documents that look more casual than they are.
The proposta: an offer that binds you
The proposta di acquisto (purchase proposal) arrives as a friendly offer on the agent's printed form. It is normally irrevocable for a stated period, and the moment the seller accepts within it you are bound. The agent's commission is generally treated as earned then, not at the deed.
Read the acceptance deadline, and what becomes of the cheque you attach. Anything you want in the deal — a mortgage condition, a survey condition, a deadline for the seller to fix a planning irregularity — must be in the proposta; afterwards you are asking a favour, not negotiating.
Why the binding moment feels early if you have bought at home
In England and Wales your solicitor exchanges contracts, and until exchange either side may walk away — hence gazumping. Italy offers no such window: the equivalent of exchange can happen when the seller signs the agent's form. Scottish missives and Irish contracts bind earlier, closer to the Italian position; Quebec's promesse d'achat and notarial deed will feel familiar. Several Australian states give a statutory cooling-off period; Italy gives a private buyer none, and consumer withdrawal rules do not reach contracts transferring rights in land.
Nor does the money sit with anyone neutral: what a solicitor, conveyancer or escrow agent would hold at home goes straight to the seller, with no title insurance behind you.
The compromesso: one word decides the deal
The contratto preliminare, or compromesso, is the full agreement: parties, property, price, payment schedule, completion date, warranties, default. It does not transfer ownership, but it is enforceable — if the seller refuses to complete, article 2932 of the Civil Code lets the buyer ask a court for a judgment producing the effects of the unsigned deed.
Two clauses decide what happens if things go wrong; translations often render both as "deposit".
Caparra confirmatoria (article 1385). A deposit with teeth: if you default the seller may withdraw and keep it; if the seller defaults you may withdraw and claim double. Or keep the contract alive and sue for performance or termination with damages, the deposit then counting as an advance — one route or the other. Whether a court may cut back a caparra manifestly out of proportion is contested, so negotiate the figure rather than count on a judge.
Caparra penitenziale (article 1386). This one prices a right to walk away: whoever withdraws loses the deposit or repays double, and that ends it — no claim to force the sale, no further damages. Buyers sign it believing they have bought protection when they have sold the seller a cheap exit. A sum described merely as an acconto carries neither mechanism.
Registering the preliminary, and how long it protects you
An unregistered preliminary binds the seller personally and nothing more. If the seller resells the property, a creditor registers a charge against it, or the seller becomes insolvent before the deed, you are an unsecured creditor chasing your own money.
Registration in the land registry — trascrizione, under article 2645-bis of the Civil Code — gives your claim priority over anything registered afterwards. Two conditions are missing from most English-language summaries.
It cannot be done with the agent's form. A preliminary is registrable only as a public deed or as a private writing with authenticated signatures: a notary must be involved at the preliminary stage, not only at the deed. Whether an Italian consulate abroad can do it instead is not something to plan around: consular notarial powers are limited, and the answer depends on the parties and the document — check it before booking anything. Build that appointment into the timetable.
The protection expires. The reservation effect lapses, and counts as never produced, unless the definitive deed — or another act performing the preliminary, or a court claim to enforce it — is registered within one year of the completion date the parties fixed, and within three years of registering the preliminary. A date that slips past that window takes the priority with it.
It is not free: the notary's fee, registration and land-registry taxes, and tax on sums already paid, credited at the deed. Those rules changed recently — ask for the figure on your own contract.
New builds are a regime of their own: a developer selling a building still to be built must bond the sums you pay before the deed, and for contracts caught by the 2019 reform the preliminary must itself be notarial and registered. A missing bond exposes the contract to a nullity only the buyer can invoke, and which version applies turns on when the building permit was sought.
The checks belong before the proposta
The sequence we are most often asked to unpick: proposta accepted, compromesso signed, deposit paid, and only then does anybody look at the building. A layout that does not match the filed plans, or a terrace enclosed without permission, leaves a property hard to mortgage or resell.
Title chain; mortgages and seizures; cadastral plans checked against the building by a surveyor on site; permits, variations and any amnesty; the condominium's recent minutes and a written statement of arrears, since a buyer is liable alongside the seller for its charges for the current year and the one before. Check the seller too: spouses married under the Italian community-of-property regime must both join in the sale; an inherited property needs every heir. Our guide to property due diligence has the fuller list; what the notary does and does not verify is in what happens at an Italian notarial deed.
Three things to arrange before you sign
An Italian tax code. The codice fiscale is needed to register the contract, open an account and pay the taxes; it is free and available from abroad through a consulate — see how to get one from abroad.
The money route. Funds from a British, Irish, Canadian, US or Australian account will be traced: the bank asks their origin, and the means of payment go in the deed. Start that paperwork early; the price is fixed in euro while months pass.
Someone able to sign for you. A specific power of attorney — property, seller, price ceiling, conditions your attorney may accept — covers both compromesso and deed. Executed abroad it needs notarisation, an apostille and a sworn translation: the FCDO in the UK, the Department of Foreign Affairs in Ireland, DFAT in Australia, provincial authorities in Canada since it joined the Apostille Convention in January 2024, and in the US the Secretary of State where the notary is commissioned. Mechanics in signing without travelling.
Neither the agent nor the notary acts for you: one is paid when the deal closes, the other must be impartial. That gap is what a buyer's own lawyer fills, with your solicitor or attorney at home.
If you have already signed something, send it over: a signed proposta or compromesso is a normal place to start. The first conversation costs nothing, and what makes sense next depends on the documents and your circumstances.