The elective residence visa
The elective residence visa is the route of the person who moves to Italy to live on an income earned elsewhere: a pension, rents, dividends, the proceeds of a sale. It is the visa most often requested by British citizens since 2021, and the one most often refused, because the consulates read the condition of the means strictly and because the applicant must intend to settle, not to spend part of the year.
The conditions
The applicant must show a stable income from sources other than work, in Italy or abroad, sufficient to live in Italy without recourse to employment. The consulates apply a threshold which the Ministry derived from the table of the social allowance, around thirty-one or thirty-two thousand euro a year for a single applicant in the practice of 2026, increased for a spouse and for each child, and they treat it as a floor rather than a target. Income from employment, present or future, is not taken into account, and the London consulate says so in terms. The applicant must hold a home in Italy, owned or rented under a lease registered with the Agenzia delle Entrate, and must intend to transfer the residence permanently, with the registration in the comune and the health insurance which the permit requires until the registration with the health service.
The application in London
The Consulate General in London receives the applicant in person, with the form, the passport valid for at least three months beyond the visa and with two blank pages, a photograph, a letter which explains the reasons of the move, the reservation of a one-way journey, the deed or the registered lease, the letters of the banks, of the pension providers or of the advisers which show the income and its sources, and the tax returns of the last two years. A resident of the United Kingdom who is not British adds the proof of the British status. The visa is a national visa of type D, valid for one year, and the fee follows the consular tariff.
After arrival
Within eight working days of the entry the holder requests the residence permit for elective residence through the postal kit, with the stamp duty, the fee and the contribution, and attends the Questura for the fingerprints. The first permit is issued for one year, the later ones for two, each renewed on the proof that the income and the home remain, and after five years of continuous permits the long-term EU permit is open, with the test of Italian at level A2. The holder of the permit may not work, in employment or on his own account, and a change of circumstances is met by a conversion to another permit. Ten years of legal residence open the naturalisation, two for the child or grandchild of an Italian citizen by birth.
A retired couple from Kent, with two occupational pensions and the rent of a flat in London, buy a house in Umbria in 2026. They apply in London with the deed, the pension statements, the letters of the banks and two years of tax returns, obtain the visa in the autumn, register the residence in the comune in the winter and receive the first permit in the spring. The husband, whose mother was born in Perugia, applies for naturalisation after two years of registered residence, with the B1 certificate.
If you are planning to settle in Italy on your pension or your investments, send us the figures of your income, the documents of the home and the composition of the family. We tell you whether the file meets the practice of the consulate and prepare it with the translations it requires.