tourists”Would we have opened a hotel? Certain! It’s our job (…) but in Venice competition is not free and the famous blocking resolution does nothing but protect positional income”
These are the exact words used by Daniele Busi, delegate of Delta real estate, owner of the Calle dei Guardiani complex, i.e. 32 apartments in buildings once belonging to public housing. Immobiliare Delta was denied the change of use of the properties, necessary to transform them from residences to hospitality businesses. The company, however, plans to build the apartments for tourists through the use of the Short-Term Tourist Rental contract, which does not require a change of intended use and thus effectively allows it to circumvent the “hotel block” resolution (variant to the urban plan for the historic center approved by the City Council in 2017).
Mr Mayor, Dear Councillors, Dear Councillors,
as the Civic Observatory on housing and residential use (OCIO) we have collected several similar examples in which real estate companies, banks and multinationals use the tool of the Short-Term Tourist Rental contract to create de facto hotels in properties intended for residential use.
The system is now well-established and allows anyone who wishes to easily overcome the limitations of the so-called “block hotel” resolution.
This is the case for “Palazzo dei Fiori” of the Toscanini fund (therefore managed by Generali) near Campo San Maurizio. The entire building, 4 floors and 3 mezzanines, houses 16 apartments: in all, 33 rooms and 77 beds. homes for
This is the case for the “San Teodoro palace”, near Campo San Salvador: the 13 luxury holiday home apartments that compose it are all rented under the Tourist Lease regime and for the 12 apartments and 50 beds of “Ai Patrizi”. Until recently both were managed by the same company which also managed the Hotel Nani Mocenigo (in Fondamenta San Trovaso) and the Hotel Ai Reali (in the former TAR headquarters in Campo della Fava). Judging by the reviews, both were at some point a dependency of the hotels mentioned, where guests had to go for check-ins.
This is the case for the 12-apartment building of the structure called “Be Mate Ponte di Rialto” that Sidief, the BankItalia real estate company, owns in Calle degli Stagneri. In 2019, when the entire building is affected by major renovations, Sidief guarantees the maintenance of the “destination of the building for residential use”. The tenants have partly already left, with contracts expiring or expired. In fact there are no changes of intended use: all the apartments are in tourist rental managed by Bemate.srl (a Spanish company of the Room Mate group).
These are just a few examples, which make it clear that the Resolution – approved by the Municipality led by Mayor Brugnaro in 2018 – is now an empty instrument, without a brake on tourist rentals extended to entire properties for residential use.
We ask, as an Observatory and as citizens, that the spirit of the Resolution be respected which proposes the shareable objective of putting a stop to uncontrolled transformations from office or residential to hospitality.
One of the simplest ways, while waiting for an adequate regulation of the LT, is the correct and immediate application of article 42 of the Building Regulations of the Municipality of Venice – approved with resolution of the City Council n. 70 of 13 December 2019 and in force from 15 February 2020 – which prescribes that, in buildings consisting of multiple real estate units, there can be multiple B&B or tourist rental activities as long as “they are not in physical communication with each other or placed in direct continuity” .
A rule that clearly expresses the need to prevent tourist hospitality activities from being installed predominantly, if not exclusively, on the same floor of a building or in an entire building, which end up significantly altering not only the residential use of the property, but as well as the liveability of the same.
We confidently await that – this administration’s declarations on the need to introduce a regulation to limit short-term rentals – will be followed by concrete actions starting from blocking these attempts to circumvent the already existing rules.
We send this letter to the local press for information.
Best regards,
The staff of OCIO, Civic Observatory on housing and residential care
