Tourism in Tuscany after Constitutional Court Judgment No. 186/2025

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Short-term rentals, non-hotel accommodation facilities and land-use governance: the constitutional validity of the regional framework and its implementation

Tuscany’s tourism framework has passed its main constitutional review. In Judgment No. 186 of 2025, deposited on 16 December 2025, the Constitutional Court examined the challenges brought by the President of the Council of Ministers against Articles 22(6), 41(3) and (4), 42 to 45, 59 and 144 of Regional Law No. 61 of 31 December 2024, the “Consolidated Tourism Act”.

The decision did not undermine the structure of the reform. On the contrary, it recognised the constitutional validity of the regional provisions intended to regulate the quality of tourist accommodation, contain its expansion in areas subject to particularly intense tourist pressure and enable municipalities to adopt measures tailored to the characteristics of their respective territories.

The judgment does not, however, confer general immunity on the regional legislation or on municipal regulations. The Court upheld the challenged provisions within the limits and for the reasons set out in its reasoning, without prejudice to the requirements of reasonableness, impartiality, necessity and proportionality, or to the administrative courts’ power to review individual implementing measures.

1. The outcome of the constitutional proceedings

The operative part of the judgment distinguishes between questions that were unfounded and questions that were inadmissible.

The Court found unfounded the challenges concerning:

Article 22(6), on the municipality’s power to reduce the maximum percentage increase in hotel accommodation capacity;
Article 41(3), on the requirement that non-hotel accommodation facilities with the physical characteristics of residential dwellings have a tourist-accommodation land-use designation;
Article 41(4), on the limits applicable to the operation of several facilities within the same building;
Articles 42 to 45, which require the main categories of non-hotel accommodation facilities to be operated on a business basis;
Article 59, which gives municipalities with a high tourist density and provincial capitals the power to regulate short-term tourist rentals; and
Article 144(3), concerning the transitional arrangements for land-use designation.

The Court declared inadmissible, owing to insufficient reasoning in the State’s application, the challenges concerning Article 41(3) in relation to Articles 41 and 42 of the Constitution and Article 41(4) in relation to Articles 3 and 42 of the Constitution.

The distinction is significant. A declaration of inadmissibility is not a decision on the full constitutional validity of the provision. It reflects the failure to satisfy the procedural burden of setting out, in sufficiently specific terms, the grounds of challenge in proceedings brought directly before the Constitutional Court.

2. Regional competence over accommodation facilities

The first general principle affirmed by the Court concerns the allocation of legislative powers between the State and the Regions.

The classification and administrative regulation of accommodation facilities, including non-hotel facilities, fall within the Regions’ residual legislative competence in the field of tourism. The Region may therefore establish the organisational, structural and management requirements necessary for an activity to be included in the regional system of classified accommodation facilities.

The State’s exclusive competence in matters of civil law remains applicable to the regulation of contracts and their legal effects. Regional legislation cannot amend the law governing leases, but it may regulate the administrative requirements preceding and external to the contract and the conditions for operating a classified tourist-accommodation business.

This produces an essential distinction between:

a tourist lease, which remains a contractual relationship governed by national civil and tax law, in addition to the administrative requirements laid down by regional law; and
a non-hotel accommodation facility, which forms part of the organised regional tourism offer and must comply with the requirements established by Tuscan law.

The formal description chosen by the operator is not, however, conclusive. The distinction must also be assessed in light of the services actually provided and the effective manner in which the activity is operated.

3. The requirement of business operation

Articles 42 to 45 of Regional Law No. 61 of 2024 provide that room-rental businesses, bed and breakfasts, holiday homes and period residences must be operated on a business basis.

The Court held that this requirement concerns the manner in which accommodation facilities are operated and does not regulate the content of the contracts entered into with guests. It therefore falls within the field of tourism and does not encroach upon the State’s competence over civil law.

In practical terms, operating on a business basis generally entails registration with the Companies Register, opening a VAT position and applying the tax rules governing business income. The Court nevertheless emphasised that an owner who does not wish to assume those obligations is not deprived altogether of the possibility of using the property for tourism-related purposes: subject to the applicable limits, tourist leasing remains possible.

The constitutional validity of the regional choice was also linked to the social function of property. The regulation of the quality of the accommodation offer, the preservation of fair competition between professional operators and the containment of overtourism may justify an administrative framework governing the ways in which property may be used for economic purposes.

4. Tourist-accommodation land use and the expiry of the transitional period

Article 41(3) provides that non-hotel accommodation facilities with the physical characteristics of residential dwellings may be operated only in buildings having, for planning purposes, a tourist-accommodation land-use designation.

The Court rejected the argument that the continued physical characteristics of a residential dwelling are incompatible with a tourist-accommodation designation. The two aspects are distinct: the first concerns the structural configuration of the building, while the second concerns the stable operational use made of it.

According to the judgment, where a property is used on a stable and organised basis for a business tourist-accommodation activity, it is reasonable to require the planning designation to be consistent with that use. Residential and tourist-accommodation uses constitute separate functional categories for urban-planning purposes.

Article 144(3) postponed the application of this requirement until 1 July 2026. Until that date, properties used as non-hotel accommodation facilities could retain either a residential or a tourist-accommodation designation.

As at 5 October 2026, the transitional period has therefore expired. For activities subject to the new regime, the stable use of a property as a non-hotel accommodation facility must be accompanied by a tourist-accommodation land-use designation, in accordance with the applicable planning rules and the municipal procedures governing changes of use.

The expiry of the transitional period does not automatically make every pre-existing activity unlawful. A distinction must be drawn between the rules on land-use designation and the specific transitional rules applicable to activities that were already authorised or operated on a non-business basis, for which Article 144 lays down separate provisions.

5. The limit on facilities operated within the same building

Article 41(4) provides that the activity of a room-rental business, bed and breakfast or period residence carried on by the same person, or by companies controlled by or connected with that person, in several facilities located in the same building may not exceed the number of rooms and the accommodation capacity permitted for a single facility.

The purpose of the provision is to prevent the dimensional limits applicable to small accommodation facilities from being circumvented by formally dividing one activity into several businesses.

The Court held that the provision falls within the regional legislature’s discretion in the field of tourism. The limit is intended to preserve the specific nature of room-rental businesses, bed and breakfasts and period residences and to ensure a diversified accommodation offer.

The framework was further confirmed by Judgment No. 218 of 2025, which examined the amendment introduced by Tuscan Regional Law No. 7 of 17 January 2025. That provision clarified that the transitional regime for operators already managing two facilities in the same building would end on 31 December 2025.

From 1 January 2026, an operator managing two room-rental businesses or two bed and breakfasts in the same building may therefore continue only if the facilities, taken together, comply with the dimensional limit applicable to a single facility. Otherwise, the operator must consider the alternatives permitted by law, including reducing the activity, changing the accommodation category, relocating one facility to another building or using the property for tourist leasing, in each case subject to the applicable rules.

6. Short-term tourist rentals: municipal regulatory powers

Article 59 is the most innovative provision of the reform.

Municipalities with a high tourist density and all provincial capitals may adopt regulations identifying areas in which specific criteria and limits may be established for short-term tourist rentals, including rentals operated on a business basis.

The regional legislation sets out the objectives and the principal factors to be considered. The regulations must pursue, among other aims:

the proper tourist use of the historical, artistic and cultural heritage;
the preservation of the social fabric; and
the availability of dwellings for long-term rentals on economically accessible terms.

Municipalities must consider, in particular, the ratio between beds and resident population, the distribution of accommodation facilities, the characteristics of the urban fabric, the historical and landscape value of the areas concerned, quality standards and the impact on permanent housing.

The measures may include restrictions on the activity in certain areas, ratios between floor area and number of guests, quality requirements and caps on the number of authorisations.

In municipalities that adopt such regulations, the activity in the relevant areas is subject to a five-year authorisation for each housing unit, without prejudice to the municipality’s power to establish a maximum number of authorisations for specific homogeneous zones. The regional legislation provides a special regime for the short-term rental of part of the unit in which the landlord resides, as well as of a single room within that unit.

The Court primarily classified Article 59 under tourism and land-use governance. The municipal power does not directly regulate the contents of the lease contract; rather, it establishes a prior administrative regime for carrying on an economic activity in areas characterised by specific territorial pressures.

The local nature of the problems involved was regarded by the Court as a factor supporting regulation at regional and municipal level. The regulations must nevertheless be based on adequate fact-finding and consistent reasoning. A regulation cannot become a general prohibition or impose restrictions unrelated to the actual conditions of the area concerned.

7. Implementation in Tuscany: Florence as the first test case

The main implementing measure is the Regulation of the Municipality of Florence on short-term tourist rentals, approved by Council Resolution No. 27 of 5 May 2025 and expressly referred to by the Court in Judgment No. 186 of 2025.

Florence is the first Tuscan case in which the power provided for by Article 59 has been translated into a comprehensive municipal framework, including an authorisation system and territorial limits affecting new initiatives and, under the municipal transitional regime, existing activities.

The regulation has been challenged before the Regional Administrative Court for Tuscany. Accordingly, as at 5 October 2026, the Florence framework can be regarded as substantially implemented at regulatory level, but not yet definitively settled at judicial level. The Constitutional Court recognised the regional and municipal powers in the abstract; it did not replace the administrative court in reviewing the legality of individual regulatory provisions.

Earlier urban-planning litigation in Florence also shows that short-term rental rules must be read within the broader framework of municipal planning. The Regional Administrative Court for Tuscany held that the adoption of a new operational plan incompatible with an amendment to the previous urban-planning regulations may bring the effects of interim safeguarding measures to an end and amount to an implicit abandonment of the earlier amendment. See, among others, Judgments Nos. 855, 856, 858, 860 and 867 of 2024 of the Regional Administrative Court for Tuscany.

Those precedents do not directly resolve the new proceedings concerning the regulation adopted under Article 59, but they identify an important interpretative criterion: restrictions on tourist rentals must be coordinated with the planning instruments in force and with the evolution of municipal planning, avoiding the simultaneous application of incompatible rules.

8. Further developments concerning land-use governance

Subsequent administrative case law confirms that tourist-accommodation and residential uses are not interchangeable without planning consequences.

In Judgment No. 163 of 2026, the Regional Administrative Court for Tuscany held that the imposition of obligations to provide or monetise planning standards was lawful in connection with a redevelopment project involving a change from tourist-accommodation to residential use. The change was regarded as comparable to new construction for the purposes of its impact on the urban burden.

The decision concerns a different situation from the requirement under Article 41(3), but it reinforces the planning significance of the transition between the two functional categories. A change of use is not merely formal: it may affect planning standards, parking spaces, territorial facilities and contractual obligations imposed on the owner.

The case law also confirms the practical importance of distinguishing a tourist lease from a non-hotel accommodation business. In Judgment No. 1,394 of 2025, the Regional Administrative Court for Tuscany held that the provision of services such as cleaning during the stay, linen changes and the supply of food and beverages may demonstrate that the activity is not a pure tourist lease but a non-hotel accommodation business requiring the relevant administrative title.

The formal wording of lease agreements is not sufficient to establish the legal nature of the activity. The services actually offered, the manner of management and the evidence collected by the municipal authorities may prevail in determining whether the activity falls within the regulatory framework for accommodation facilities.

9. The level of implementation as at 5 October 2026

The Tuscan framework displays different levels of implementation.

The regional legislation is fully in force and its principal structure has been upheld by the Constitutional Court. The rules on business operation of non-hotel accommodation facilities are now operative, subject to the transitional regimes applicable to pre-existing activities. The transitional period for the land-use designation of properties stably used as non-hotel accommodation facilities expired on 1 July 2026.

The overall limit on facilities operated by the same person in the same building has also been operative since 1 January 2026, following the expiry of the transitional regime for pre-existing operators.

Implementation of Article 59, by contrast, depends on the individual municipalities. Local authorities are not required to adopt a restrictive regulation: the regional law gives them a power to do so where specific territorial needs exist and after adequate fact-finding.

The applicable rules are therefore not uniform throughout Tuscany. For each municipality, it is necessary to verify:

whether the regulation contemplated by Article 59 has been adopted;
which zones or areas it covers;
whether quantitative or qualitative limits apply;
whether a five-year authorisation is required;
what transitional regime has been established for properties already used for short-term rentals in 2024; and
how the municipal regulation is coordinated with the planning instruments and the building title relating to the property.

The level of implementation may therefore be described as complete as regards the validity of the regional legislation, but differentiated and still evolving as regards municipal regulations and administrative litigation.

Conclusions

Judgment No. 186 of 2025 marks a significant stage in the regulation of tourism in Tuscany. The Court recognised that the Region may regulate classified accommodation facilities, impose organisational and management requirements on them, link the stable operation of the activity to a tourist-accommodation land-use designation and give municipalities regulatory tools for short-term rentals in areas subject to significant tourist pressure.

Judgment No. 218 of 2025 completed the framework by confirming the constitutional validity of the expiry, on 1 January 2026, of the transitional regime applicable to operators managing several facilities in the same building.

The constitutional principle that emerges is one of differentiated territorial regulation: rules governing tourist activities may indirectly affect the owner’s powers, provided that they pursue objectives of social utility, are consistent with the actual circumstances and comply with the principles of reasonableness and proportionality.

For operators, the analysis can no longer be limited to the abstract distinction between a lease and an accommodation business. It is necessary to examine together the form of operation, the services offered, the planning designation, the location of the property, any municipal regulation, and the applicable transitional regime. In Tuscany, the new system is therefore in force, but its practical implementation remains largely territorial and will continue to be defined by the interaction between regional legislation, municipal regulations, urban planning and administrative case law.