Florenceculture & etiquette

Since 2025 the comune has blocked new short tourist lets in the UNESCO historic core, grandfathering only properties already regularly let in 2024. In May 2026 the Tuscan administrative court rejected the nineteen challenges brought against the regulation, and in June 2026 the council extended the block to nine further zones in the belt around the centre. Short lets now need a five-year authorisation tied to both owner and property, units must be at least 28 square metres, and keyboxes on façades have been banned since 2025. The practical effect for you is that stock is slowly returning to long lets — but also that a landlord offering you an informal short-term arrangement in the centre may be doing something the comune now polices.

The tax code is free, issued the same day at an Agenzia delle Entrate office with a passport, and required before a lease, a bank account, a SIM contract or SSN registration. Non-EU nationals arriving on a sponsored work or family visa are usually assigned one at the Sportello Unico. Florence's student population makes this the single most common bottleneck in September, when several thousand people need one in the same fortnight — go in the first week, not the third.

Non-EU arrivals on a long-stay visa collect a yellow kit at a Poste Italiane counter marked 'Sportello Amico', complete it, attach a €16 revenue stamp bought at a tobacconist, and hand it back with roughly €30 in postal and permit fees. The postal receipt is your proof of lawful stay while the Questura di Firenze processes it. The clock runs from the day you cross the border, not from finding a flat — and you can file using a hospitality declaration if you have not yet signed a lease.

Idealista put Florence at €22.3 per square metre a month in the second quarter of 2026 — behind Milan, ahead of Venice and well ahead of Rome — in a comune of under 370,000 people. Two decades of short-let conversion plus a very large student and study-abroad population did that. A one-bed in or near the centre is €1,000–1,500; rooms in shared flats, which is how most people here actually live, run €500–800. Look north and east — Rifredi, Novoli, Campo di Marte — where the tramvia and the regional trains make the difference in cost far larger than the difference in journey time.

Nearly the whole historic centre is a limited-traffic zone with camera gates, and there are additional night-time restrictions in the entertainment areas on weekend evenings in the warmer months. A single wrong turn produces a fine per gate crossed. Hotels can register a guest's plate for a short window; residents obtain a permit tied to a specific sector. Foreign plates are pursued months later through international recovery agents. If you are moving in with a van, arrange the temporary authorisation with the comune in advance — retroactive appeals almost never succeed.

Under D.Lgs. 209/2023, 50% of qualifying employment or professional income is exempt up to €600,000 a year for five tax periods, conditional on a high qualification or specialisation, three prior years of non-residence and a commitment to remain tax resident four years. The old regime exempted 70%, and 90% in the southern regions — Tuscany never had the southern rate, but plenty of guidance aimed at Florence still quotes the 70%. Anyone moving now should model on 50%.