The professionals involved in property deals in Italy

While looking at the property purchasing in Italy, it is important to understand, which specialists can help you to make the deal, their duties and what they are responsible for.

All realtors operating in Italy must be properly qualified, officially registered with the local Chamber of commerce and have proper professional indemnity insurance. They are responsible for searching for the best options and organising the whole purchasing process. 

At the stage of searching for and choosing the real property, estate agent is a buyer's main assistant.  Also, if realtor represents the interests of both sides, and does not work exclusively for one of them, he must remain neutral and not lobby interests of either side.

Estate agent duties are:

• help to sort out the prices; 
• tell about purchase procedure; 
• find matching options of the properties; 
• give information about the area; 
• organise the showing of the place, and help in communicating with sellers and agreeing on conditions of purchase;
• make a written offer of purchase to the seller on buyer's behalf; get the papers to be checked by notary;
• be an organising coordinator of notarial deed.

Realtor is not responsible for checking the technical condition of the property, cannot check the presence of mortgage and various other charges, but neither is he allowed to conceal known details from sides, and it's his duty to do everything possible to defend the client's interests.

Estate agent's job is considered done after the sides have signed an offer about purchase or preliminary sales contract, and he has a right to demand payment, while keeping his duties to client to provide organisational support, up to the point of signing notarial deed.

Many countries are missing the equivalent for this job. The Geometra is a professional, who mainly works in constructing / renovating a property and in estimate field. He is part design technician, part engineer and part project manager.

When you buy a home or if you plan to renovate a property in Italy this specialist can evaluate the property's technical condition and warn buyer about potential problems.

Geometra is dealing with the following issues:

• evaluating technical condition of the buildings and structures; 
• projecting jobs; 
• getting building and planning permits and registering them in the according organisations; 
• technical supervision of the building works; 
• legalization and making entries to Cadastre;
• topography-geospatial, prospecting jobs.

All property deeds in Italy are made with the involvement of a notary, who is responsible for checking legality of the sales and purchases, making sure that due taxes are paid when transferring rights to the property.

During first check, notary notifies about ability to make a deed. If all is well, or if some effort on the seller's side is required (for instance, to renew the cadastral documents or make a certificate of energy inspection), notary gives the green light. However, if there are some difficulties, he lets the buyer know via the realtor.

Notary must:

• check presence of owing mortgages;
• establish legality of ownership find out about who needs to sign the agreement to sell; 
• make sure all property titles are in order and request a historical information from the cadastre, in case it is needed;
• check the actuality of the cadastral documents from the taxes point of view, about the difference between cadastral plans and actual building's condition, in case of any of the redevelopments, property owner must notify of such;
• calculate the tax amount, taken when registering the property ownership;
• make an agreement, carry out the deed of purchase and sale in a Registration chamber, receive it back and hand out the copies, certified by notary. Original papers are not given out.