For reasons which may or may not be related to current events, a lot of people fantasize about moving to Italy. We’re a top travel destination for a host of reasons after all… the food, wine, scenery and pace of life here all seem to offer those elusive quality of life indicators that foreigners seek. If it’s so great to visit here, surely it would be even better to live here, right?
Before I moved here 15 years ago, I certainly had those fantasies of a sweeter life on the other side of the Atlantic. But even as I pictured myself drinking wine on sunny piazzas, getting lost in a labyrinth of medieval alleys, reveling in the everyday charms of life in Italy, and somehow finding the “home” that had always eluded me, I also tried to be realistic. What if I got here and didn’t like it? What if it was too hard to make friends and be accepted by Italians? What if I never overcame the language barrier? What if everything was just too difficult and I were worse-off, in any number of ways, than I’d been in the US?
So, I didn’t make my move to Italy spontaneously. I tested the waters first, by spending a summer on my own in Orvieto — this, after several vacations and extended stays in Italy — to try and decide if I really liked it as much as I thought I’d like it. (In retrospect, it was an uncharacteristically smart approach!)
With that in mind, I thought I’d discuss some ways that foreigners entertaining the idea of a move to Italy might try it on for size, first, and then, con calma (calmly), as we like to say, decide if you’re really ready to make a permanent move to Italy, or whether your Italian dream is better realized on vacation.
Dip your toes in with a stay in a small town
OK, so my bias is showing — again. But an excellent first litmus test of whether the Italian lifestyle is well-suited to your own is to start small — as in a small village like Allerona. Our weeklong Immersive Umbria tours, currently offered in spring and fall, provide just that — the chance to “live” in our medieval village for a week, get to know our family and friends, and attune to daily life in a small town. You may fall in love with Allerona (and to be honest, most of our guests do), but the very slow pace of life here may or may not be for you.
For example, it’s one thing to stay a week in a tiny village where the only sound at night is the tolling of the clock tower and the occasional barking dog. It’s quite another to pass a long, dark winter in a town that rolls up its sidewalks at sundown, which happens around 4:30 pm during Daylight Standard Time. I’ve gotten quite used to it, but I can see how people accustomed to large cities could find the quiet here…disquieting.
Wade in with an extended visit
Assuming your repeat trips to Italy have left you wanting more, the next step towards making a decision about a move is to stay a while — at least a month or two — in a medium-term rental. That’s what I did in the summer of 2008, when I spent two months in Orvieto in order to decide if I really wanted to move to Italy, and how I could make that work from a practical and financial standpoint.
As fate would have it, I met Paolo at the end of my stay, and the practicalities of my move became a lot less complicated. I can’t guarantee you’ll find your own tall, handsome Italian, but staying here for a month or more really does offer more of an immersion in day-to-day life, including the banalities of grocery shopping, trips to the post office or dry cleaners, etc. — the stuff that makes up everyday life anywhere. And at the risk of getting psychoanalytic, an extended stay also offers time for some self-evaluation…space to examine whether it’s really Italy you want to escape to, and just what it is you might be trying to escape from.
When I was here in 2008, it was the pre-Airbnb era, and the short- and medium-term rental market in Italy has changed dramatically since then. You can still find places, but it helps to know people who know people. For example, we could probably help line up something in Allerona or nearby. An agency like TrustedHousesitters is also a good option for finding homeowners who are looking for people to stay in their homes (and often, look after their pets) during an extended absence.
Dive in by buying or renting a second home in Italy
I could devote pages to the complexities of buying or renting a second home in Italy, but I will largely leave that to the experts. Briefly, though, it’s what a lot of foreigners opt to do, as having a second home in Italy allows them to live part of the year here, without having to pull up stakes and move to Italy full-time.
In Allerona, there are several Americans who are part-time residents, visiting at least twice a year and staying for months at a time. They either own homes here or have multi-year leases and visit as tourists, with no visa required. I’m simplifying here but basically, this allows them to stay for up to 90 days within a 180-day period. Then they go back to the US (or at least leave the EU’s Schengen area) for at least 90 days before returning to their digs in Italy.
The deepest dive: moving to Italy full time
If you really think you’re ready to live in Italy full-time, start by reading my colleague Laura Itzkowitz’s article on the different types of Italian visas and residency schemes available for foreigners. Laura, who lives in Rome and writes the excellent The New Roman Times newsletter, provides a very clear overview of what your options might be, as well as a list of resources if you want to delve further into a permanent move to Italy.
If you come visit us at Villaggio Tours, we can arrange for you to view some of the houses that are available for sale in Allerona — some of the tinier ones are priced under €50,000. Paolo is an experienced stone mason with his own construction company, so he can provide an honest assessment of how much work and cost might be involved with renovations, which will surely be needed.
Your visit to Allerona may well result in you wanting to put down roots here, or at least daydreaming about doing so. But even if it doesn’t, we’re always happy to talk about life in Italy — warts and all. I’ve never once regretted my decision to move here, and, 15 years later, nothing makes me happier than welcoming guests and sharing with them our day-to-day experiences in our village on a hill in rural Umbria.
