Glossary
The terms you'll hear every day running an Italian short-term rental portfolio. Short, pragmatic definitions written for property managers.
Tourist rental shorter than 30 days, without a formal residency contract.
Italian short-term rentals are regulated by Law 96/2017: rental of a residential property for up to 30 days. No VAT number required for owners managing up to 4 apartments; above that, an ATECO code is mandatory with either ordinary tax or the 21% flat tax (cedolare secca).
Professional who manages one or more short-term rental apartments on behalf of owners.
Handles pricing, bookings, guest communication, check-in, cleaning, maintenance and reviews. Two common models: full-service agency and co-host (partial help to the owner). Fees typically range from 15% to 30% of gross revenue.
Software that syncs bookings and availability across multiple OTAs (Airbnb, Booking, Vrbo).
Aggregates calendars, rates and inventory in a single panel, preventing overbooking. Popular tools in Italy: Smoobu, Lodgify, Hostaway, Beds24. Usually integrates with most PMS and with tax/reporting portals.
Central management system for rooms, guests, cleaning and accounting of a rental business.
Differs from a channel manager: the PMS is the operational core, the channel manager is the distribution layer. Some vendors combine both (Smoobu, Lodgify). Modern PMS expose REST APIs for integrations with AI concierges like Verto, analytics dashboards and tax tools.
Online booking platform: Booking.com, Airbnb, Expedia, Vrbo.
Each OTA charges a commission between 3% and 18% of the booking value. Diversification is essential: relying on a single OTA exposes hosts to penalties, account suspensions and algorithmic dependency.
Mandatory identifier for listing a short-term rental in Italy.
Since 2025 the CIR is flanked by the national CIN (DL 145/2023). The CIR must be shown on Airbnb, Booking listings and on the manager's website. Each Italian region has its own rules: Lazio (CIR), Lombardia (CIR), Toscana (CISR), Emilia-Romagna (CIR).
Per-night per-guest municipal tax paid by tourists, collected by the host.
Introduced by D.Lgs. 23/2011, ranges from €0.50 to €7 per night depending on the municipality and property category. The host acts as tax collector: collects, pays monthly and files yearly reports. Many cities have online portals (Modena, Bologna, Roma Capitale).
Two key KPIs: ADR = average revenue per sold night, RevPAR = revenue per available night.
ADR (Average Daily Rate) equals total room revenue divided by sold nights. RevPAR (Revenue per Available Room) equals total revenue divided by available nights. RevPAR captures both occupancy and price: a common target in Italian cultural cities is RevPAR ≥ €80.
Automatic rate updates based on demand, season, events and competition.
Tools like PriceLabs, Wheelhouse and Beyond Pricing analyse 50+ variables per night and push updates to the channel manager. Italian hosts adopting dynamic pricing typically gain 10%-22% RevPAR over static manual pricing.
Online guest registration procedure with digital signature and ID upload, without in-person meeting.
Requires collecting ID data for Alloggiati Web (State Police) within 24h. Common tools: Chekin, Smoobu guest app, Vikey. Verto AI integrates check-in over WhatsApp: the guest gets a link, uploads ID and signs, data flows to the PMS and to Alloggiati Web.
Official Meta API for sending and receiving WhatsApp messages from a server-side system.
Different from the WhatsApp Business App (mobile): the API enables automation, CRM/PMS integration and AI bots. Requires a verified Meta Business Manager and a Business Solution Provider (BSP). Verto AI uses the official API — no unofficial grey-market tools.
Automated assistant that replies to guests via chat in natural language, 24/7.
Different from rule-based chatbots: uses LLMs (Claude, GPT) to understand intent even when ambiguous, in any language. Integrates with the PMS for booking-aware replies. Verto AI is the WhatsApp-native AI concierge built for Italian property managers with 5-50 apartments.
Selling an additional service or experience to the guest before or during the stay.
Common examples: early check-in (€15-30), late check-out, welcome basket (€10-25), airport transfer, guided tours, private dinners. Well-executed upsells raise average booking revenue by 8%-14% without increasing occupancy.
Error where two confirmed bookings overlap for the same dates in the same unit.
Main cause of negative reviews and forced refunds. Prevented by a channel manager syncing calendars in real time and closing inventory immediately after a booking. Airbnb penalises accounts with overbooking cancellations.
Amount the host actually collects after OTA commissions and taxes.
Example: Booking reservation €150, 15% commission = €22.50, €4 tourist tax paid to the city, 21% flat tax on the remaining €123.50 = €25.94. Final net rate ≈ €97. Knowing the net rate per OTA is crucial when choosing distribution channels.
