Viterbo tourism travels more and more on online applications and platforms, setting new records. For the number of structures offering short-term rentals booked through applications and platforms, Tuscia is on the podium in Lazio.
Short-term rentals
Apartment accommodation is a well-established phenomenon in Italy. According to a survey conducted by Isnart, the National Tourism Research Institute, on the basis of the innovative Stendhal location intelligence tool used for predictive analyzes of tourism phenomena which uses “big data” generated by mobile apps on tourists’ smartphones.
The average number of accommodations offered in Italy is equal to 760 thousand, with a +67% in the last six years. In Lazio there are almost 62 thousand homes, 8% of those available in Italy. The greatest concentration is found in Tuscany (14%), Sicily (12%) and Lombardy (10%). In 2023 alone, almost 54 million nights were booked for a turnover of 7.2 billion.
Tuscia on the podium
In Lazio, the province with the highest number of accommodations is, naturally, Rome which is close to 41 thousand accommodations: 40 thousand 950 to be precise, an offer which has remained almost stable from 2018 to today. The capital is followed at a distance by Latina (6 thousand 491) and Viterbo (4 thousand 360). Then Rieti (1129) and Frosinone (1123).
The recovery
If Rome has not yet returned to pre-Covid levels in terms of booking accommodation via platforms (-2.9% for the city and -0.6% for the province), Tuscia recorded a +21 in 2023 .4% compared to 2019, preceded only by Frosinone (+48.7%) and Rieti (+34.4%) and above the regional (+0.9%) and national average (+14.8%).
How much did he earn? There is talk of a turnover of over a billion per year in Lazio alone, equal to almost 14% of the total revenue in Italy. Rome alone is worth 87% of the regional total, therefore approximately 870 million euros. The Eternal City, obviously, is characterized by users distributed throughout the year with accommodation occupancy equal to approximately 133 days a year compared to the Italian average of 74.
Fight against illegal activity
Short-term rentals are a very current topic in the capital of Tuscia. Recently the Municipality ordered the closure of a house-hotel in the historic centre. “No authorization had been issued for the opening and operation – underlines the mayor Chiara Frontini -. We intend to continue on this path, because the presence of some operator intending to act outside the rules and to the detriment of the of all the other operators who respect the rules to the full. We cannot allow some illegal operator to compromise the image of the city on which we are focusing and investing decisively. The results are arriving in various forms, as the numbers demonstrate growing”.
Marco Nunzi, municipal councilor responsible for production activities, explains how the controls are proceeding. “We operate with a series of cross-checks between the reports that operators are obliged to send to the police station, those sent to the Municipality and on online booking platforms, such as Booking and Airbnb. Connected to these checks there is also a tax issue very significant which concerns the failure to report to the Revenue Agency and the failure to pay the tourist tax to the municipal coffers. The foreseen sanctions reach up to 6 thousand euros”.
Short-term rentals in 2024
Returning to the survey conducted by Isnart, tourist flows were analyzed in the months of March and April, recording the presence of 10 million tourists, 51.2% of whom were foreigners. During the Easter period, the regions of Veneto, Tuscany, Lombardy, Emilia-Romagna and Lazio received the widest appreciation. Rome, Venice, Milan and Florence alone welcomed over 2 million tourists in the spring period. The capital, the Lombardy capital and Rimini form the podium of domestic tourism.
Summer 2024
According to projections for next summer, the results of the 2023 season are expected to be confirmed. To date, 50% of the rooms in Italian accommodation facilities have already been sold for the months of June, July and August and 10 million nights have been booked in private homes (+16% on last year).
“After an Easter period characterized by an excellent response in terms of tourist presences, which Isnart analyzed with the support of the Location intelligence tool it recently equipped with, summer too – comments Isnart president Loretta Credaro – looks set to more than positive, strengthening the trend of the past season. These are data which comfort us but which also call us to assume responsibility for a constant growth in the average quality of our offer, also in the perspective of the two major events of the 2025 Jubilee and the Milan-Cortina 2026 Winter Olympics, moments of strategic visibility for the entire Italian tourism chain”.
