Building without permits can have serious consequences, especially if the work is considered a building abuse. This is what happened in a municipality in Lazio, where the owners of a house have seen a demolition order delivered for a small masonry artifact built next to their home.
Convinced of being right, the owners have appealed to the regional administrative court (TAR) of Lazio, claiming that their construction was not an abuse, but a simple one technical volume intended to contain home systems. However, the TAR rejected the appeal, confirming the demolition order and clarifying when a construction can be considered abusive and subject to sanctions.
But when is a building permit really necessary? And what happens if a work is made without authorizations?
Let’s discover together the details of this case and the implications for those who want to build without problems.
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The specific case: what was built and why it was contested
The story originates in September 2018, when the local police of the Municipality of Lariano carries out an inspection at a property. During the inspection, the presence of a masonry artifact made in adherence to the main home is detected. The structure, with dimensions of approximately 2.25 meters by 2.75 meters and a height of 2.04 meters, was intended for remittance for garden tools and work.
The work, although of small size, was found without any building authorization and does not comply with the urban planning tools in force. For this reason, the municipal administration has issued a demolition order, contesting the abusiveness of the construction. According to the Municipality, in fact, the artifact was part of the category of new buildings subject to building permit, as it involved an increase in surface and volume, with a permanent urban transformation of the territory.
The owners challenged the ordinance, claiming that the artifact was a simple technical volume and therefore it did not require building permits. According to their thesis, the structure was destined to host technological systems at the service of the main home, thus configuring itself as a work of ordinary maintenance or at the maximum of free construction.
Consequently, the demolition order would have been illegitimate, since the works of this nature do not require explicit building permit.
However, the inspection of the local police denied this reconstruction, making sure that the structure did not contain any technological system and was used exclusively as a tool deposit. This element was decisive in making the artifact believe a work with its own functional autonomy And not a technical volume without autonomous destination, as supported by the applicants.
Another element of important in the dispute was the landscape existing on the area. The municipal administration highlighted that, in addition to the absence of the building permit, the construction of the structure had taken place without the necessary landscape authorization, mandatory in areas subject to protection. This further aggravated the position of the owners, since the legislation requires compliance with environmental and landscape constraints also for minor interventions.
In light of these elements, the Municipality reiterated the full legitimacy of the demolition order, believing that the artifact constituted an abusive construction in all respects and as such should be removed to restore the original state of the places.
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The reasoning of the Lazio TAR: because the appeal was rejected
After analyzing the case, the Lazio TAR rejected the appeal of the owners with sentence no. 1794/2025, confirming the validity of the demolition order issued by the Municipality of Lariano. The Court clarified that the construction in question could not be considered a simple technical volumebut a real new construction, subject to building permit and, in the absence of it, to sanctioning actions.
According to the Presidential Decree 380/2001 (Consolidated Real Text)in fact, any work that determines an increase in surface and volume is subject to specific authorization. The TAR highlighted that the artifact, although of small size (about 6.18 square meters), was not intended to contain technological systems essential for the home, but had been used as Retaired garden tools and work.
This made it a structure with functional autonomynot attributable to the category of technical volumes free from building permit.
Another crucial point of the decision concerns the landscape present on the area. The sentence underlines that the construction was carried out without the necessary landscape opinionmandatory for any building intervention in areas subject to protection. This made the artifact doubly illegitimatesince not only without building permit, but also in contrast with the regulations on the protection of the territory.
The TAR also rejected the argument of the applicants according to which the main criterion to determine the need for the building permit was theIncrement of the urban load. According to the judges, There is no rule that limits the abusiveness of a building work to the only increase in urban load. What matters is the transformation of the territory, which in the case in question was evident, having been an increase in volume and a permanent modification of the state of the places.
Finally, the TAR rejected the last complaint of the applicants, who complained of the failure to indicate the consequences of non -compliance with the order of demolition. The Court clarified that the municipal ordinance clearly specified that, In case of failure to demolition within 90 days, the area would have been acquired in the municipal heritagewith an extension of up to ten times the sedime area of the abusive artifact, as required by theart. 31 of Presidential Decree 380/2001.
Sentence no. 1794/2025 therefore confirms a clear principle: any construction that It involves an increase in surface and volumeif made without a qualification, is to be considered abusive and subject to demolition, regardless of the intended use declared by the owner.
