In common-law unions, agreements to regulate economic relations between partners are more widespread

Thus, the Supreme Court, with order 1324/2025, recognized the validity of the private agreement signed by the partners of a de facto union to regulate the aspects relating to the custody of the minor child and resolve the patrimonial issues that arose after the end of cohabitation; to interpret the contract, the principle of the search for the common intention of the contracting parties must be applied, according to which the first instrument is represented by the literal sense of the words, to be verified in the light of the entire contractual context. In fact, by "literal sense of the words" the entire literal formulation of the contractual declaration must be understood in every part and in every word that composes it and not in just one part.

The Court of Cassation then returned to the subject of the rules for the interpretation of agreements between partners with order 1879/2025. With this ruling, the judges clarified that, in order to obtain recognition of the effectiveness of a debt recognition clause in an agreement between cohabitants, the clause must be explicit in providing for the obligation to repay. However, a private agreement that simply recognizes the transfer of money is not sufficient.

Order 32682/2024, with which the Court of Cassation intervened on the issue of the revocability of a donation between partners, broadens its scope to the overall obligations between cohabitants. In the case examined, the judges recognized the revocation of the donation of a property , made by the cohabitant to his partner, for serious injury (provided for by Article 801 of the Civil Code), since the woman, having obtained the property, consolidated a secret relationship with another, removed the donor from the house and then made the new relationship public, in a disrespectful manner, damaging to the dignity of the former partner. And this even if there was no strict bond of fidelity between the two former cohabitants, given that they were not married.

Moreover, as the Court of Cassation specified in order 28/2025, de facto unions, which are a widespread social phenomenon protected by Article 2 of the Constitution, are characterized by moral and social duties of each cohabitant towards the other, which can be realized in material assistance activities and economic contributions provided not only during the cohabitation but also after its end . These duties can be configured as the fulfillment of a natural obligation (based on Article 2034 of the Civil Code), if the requirements of proportionality, spontaneity and adequacy are also met. The bond of solidarity and affection between former partners originates from the previous de facto union and is in line with the affirmation of a pluralistic conception of the family. So much so that, in this specific case, the judges deemed the contribution paid in favor of the ex to be unrepeatable, even after the end of the cohabitation, characterized by a long journey of life together and the birth of a child.

A line reiterated by the Court of Cassation with order 11337/2025, which specified that payments of money made by one partner to the other during cohabitation constitute "obligations that social conscience deems dutiful within the context of a consolidated emotional relationship, which cannot fail to imply forms of collaboration and (...) moral and material assistance". The unjust enrichment of a cohabitant occurs only if the benefits go beyond the limits of proportionality and adequacy. In the case examined, the partner's contribution to the mortgage and other expenses was considered proportionate because it "corresponded to what would notoriously have been spent as rent".