Italian Condominium Accounts: Preventivo vs Consuntivo

"Bilancio preventivo" and "bilancio consuntivo" are the practice names of two documents that the Civil Code calls something else: preventivo and rendiconto. Here you find the right words, what each document contains, who approves it and an example layout to copy and adapt. The layout is in Italian because it is meant for Italian buildings.

The words: bilancio, preventivo, consuntivo, rendiconto

We searched the condominium provisions of the Civil Code (arts. 1117-1139) and the implementing provisions (arts. 61-72). The word "bilancio" does not appear, nor does "consuntivo". "Rendiconto" appears in four articles (1129, 1130, 1130-bis and 1135). "Preventivo", as a document of expenses, appears once: in art. 1135, no. 2.

So, for the Civil Code: the preventivo is the budget of expenses, and the rendiconto is what practice calls the consuntivo or bilancio consuntivo. The practice terms are not wrong; they are simply terms the provisions do not use, and it is useful to know that when writing an agenda or a verbale.

The preventivo

Art. 1135 lists what the assembly deals with, beyond what the preceding articles provide. Number 2 is "the approval of the budget of expenses needed during the year and their sharing among the co-owners". Two things in that line: the preventivo concerns the year's expenses, and the assembly also approves the sharing among co-owners.

The sharing is not automatically by millesimi: art. 1123 provides three criteria and stairs and lifts have their own rule (art. 1124), as we explain in Tabelle Millesimali: what Italian law says. If you have the table and a figure to split, the millesimi splitter (an Italian-language page) does the sum and brings the total to the cent.

The consuntivo: it is the rendiconto

The end-of-year document is the rendiconto condominiale. Art. 1130-bis says what it contains: "income and expenditure items and every other figure on the condominium's financial position, available funds and any reserves, which must be presented so as to allow immediate verification". And it is made of three parts: "a register of accounts, a financial summary, and a brief explanatory note on the management".

No. 10 of art. 1130 requires the administrator to draw it up and convene the assembly for approval "within one hundred and eighty days". Approval is for the assembly, which under art. 1135, no. 3, also provides for "the use of the management's surplus": the expression is not defined in the text. The three parts, the one hundred and eighty days and the keeping of documents are in what an Italian rendiconto condominiale must contain.

Preventivo and consuntivo compared

• Preventivo. Concerns the expenses needed during the year and their sharing among co-owners. Approved by the assembly (art. 1135, no. 2).
• Consuntivo (rendiconto). Reports income, expenditure, financial position, funds and reserves, in a register of accounts, a financial summary and an explanatory note. The administrator draws it up and convenes the assembly within one hundred and eighty days; the assembly approves it and provides for the use of the management's surplus (arts. 1130, no. 10, 1130-bis and 1135, no. 3).

Art. 1135 says nothing about the form of the preventivo, and we do not add rules the text does not contain.

An example layout

The Civil Code fixes the minimum content, not a template. This layout is built on that minimum content, to be completed with your condominium's data. The figures are invented, only to show how the sums work: they are not data from any condominium. You can copy it into a spreadsheet or print it from the browser.

RENDICONTO CONDOMINIALE - esercizio [anno]
Condominio [via e numero civico, città]

1. REGISTRO DI CONTABILITÀ
   Movimenti in ordine cronologico, uno per riga:
   data | descrizione | fornitore | entrata | uscita | giustificativo n.
   [i movimenti sono annotati entro trenta giorni dall'effettuazione]

2. RIEPILOGO FINANZIARIO
   Saldo iniziale dell'esercizio                       2.000,00
   Entrate
     quote ordinarie versate dai condòmini            24.000,00
   Totale entrate                                     24.000,00
   Uscite per voce
     pulizia scale e parti comuni                      6.000,00
     manutenzione e revisione ascensore                3.200,00
     energia elettrica delle parti comuni              2.800,00
     assicurazione dello stabile                       1.900,00
     compenso dell'amministratore                      4.500,00
     manutenzione ordinaria                            3.600,00
   Totale uscite                                      22.000,00
   Differenza tra entrate e uscite                     2.000,00
   Saldo finale (saldo iniziale + differenza)          4.000,00
   SITUAZIONE PATRIMONIALE AL [data]
     Saldo di cassa e banca                            [__]
     Crediti verso condòmini (quote non versate)       [__]
     Debiti verso fornitori                            [__]
     Fondi disponibili e riserve: [indicare, ognuno distinto]

3. NOTA SINTETICA ESPLICATIVA DELLA GESTIONE
   Andamento dell'esercizio e scostamenti rispetto al preventivo.
   Rapporti in corso (contratti, fornitori): [elenco].
   Questioni pendenti: [elenco].

Allegati: documenti giustificativi di spesa, disponibili ai condòmini.
Data [__]                                       L'amministratore

Three notes on the layout. The register of accounts has a rule on timing: art. 1130, no. 7, says the individual movements in and out are recorded in it in chronological order, "within thirty days of the day on which they occur", and that it may also be kept electronically. Art. 1135, no. 3, speaks of the "management's surplus" without defining it: that is why the example shows only the difference between income and expenditure, and the firm calls it what it prefers. The financial-position block is there because art. 1130-bis speaks of data "on the condominium's financial position", and funds and reserves must be shown because it names them among the rendiconto's data: adapt the example's items, and which funds exist depends on the condominium.

Checking the accounts and the documents

Beyond reading it in the assembly, art. 1130-bis provides two means of control. The assembly may appoint, at any time or for several years, an auditor to verify the accounts, with the majority required for appointing the administrator. The cost is shared "among all co-owners on the basis of property millesimi". And co-owners may "inspect the supporting expense documents at any time and take copies at their own expense"; the records and documents must be kept for ten years.

What Unitify does

(The app does not yet have an Italian interface; the texts you write stay in Italian.) Easybilly keeps, throughout the year, the register of charges, invoices and payments for each unit, with the calculation rules of each building: when it is time to prepare the rendiconto, the payment data is already in one place. It does not replace accounting: the Excel export is what the administrator hands to their accountant. The brief note and the choice of how to tell the year stay with the administrator.

If the switch from another program falls mid-year, that year's rendiconto will have two sources: we explain this in switching condominium software.

If every year the rendiconto starts with twelve months of invoices to reconstruct, you can start free from the Unitify page for Italy. After approval, the notice of the next assembly starts from one of the templates we have published: the notice template.

Sources: Civil Code, arts. 1123, 1124, 1129, 1130, 1130-bis and 1135, Normattiva, accessed 16.10.2026. The quotations are our translation of the Italian text; the source texts are in the internal pack research/66. The figures in the example are invented.