A Study on Holiday Houses in Ticino

The presentstudy on holiday houses in Ticino was conducted by Osservatoriodel Turismo in collaboration with Associazionedelle Case e Appartamenti di Vacanza in Ticino (ACAV). Started in mid-2016, the study aimed at investigating the characteristics, the behaviour and the preferences of tourists renting a holiday home for their vacation in Ticino. The project represents an important instrument aimed at assessing unknown aspects of an expanding tourist phenomenon, which is often overlooked in public discussions and neglected in official tourist figures.

Data concern a sample of 318 individuals interviewed between June and September 2016. Observations concerning the structures in which tourists spent their holidays are considered as well. The greatest share of individuals was Swiss (81.4% of the sample); about 29% of respondents were 31-45 y.o., 47.3% between 46 and 60 y.o. and 20.8% were 60+ y.o. Most young tourists visited the location in couples with children (42.5% of sample) while older respondents were mainly couples (almost 40%). About 15% of interviewees were in a group. In general, tourists were already experienced with the destination although a minority of them had rented the same structure in which they spent their recent holiday in past years. Most overnight stays were located in the Sopraceneri region, mainly in Lago Maggiore (44.2%) and Gambarogno (30.0%) areas. Average length of stay was 9 days, with peaks for 7 and 14 days. Most tourists spent their vacation in an apartment (69.1%).

Data analysis revealed great heterogeneity among tourists who decided to spend their holiday in a vacation house or apartment and such heterogeneity concerns mainly aspects like the satisfaction toward the structure and the motivation for renting a holiday home. These visitors long for tranquillity and comfort that a house can offer them and prefer to stay far from an urban context. Flexibility, intimacy, and space availability have an important weight in tourists’ demand and represent a competitive advantage when positioning on the market. In particular, these peculiarities must be stressed in the phase of promotion and communication, especially when the owner aims at reaching new customers. First-timers usually are more sensitive to the attributes characterizing a holiday and are more cautious when expressing their satisfaction. In general, price is less important if compared to other factors but attention must be paid to heterogeneity among tourists since young couples with children and foreign visitors are more sensitive to this aspect.

As far as leisure activities at destination are concerned, holiday house tourists’ preferences are mainly for nature experiences, enogastronomy, relax and wellbeing. In this sense, such individuals do not differ significantly from other types of tourists that visit Ticino.

Concerning means of transport, data analysis highlighted two clear evidences. First, great majority of respondents (94.3%) used a private mean to reach the destination. Despite this fact, choice of transport mode at destination was quite varied if one considers that only half of the sample used the private transport in an exclusive way; 39.2% declared that they adopted different solutions on a case-by-case basis and 9.2% used public transport only. An interesting evidence regards the opening of AlpTranist railway: in fact, 11% of respondents stated they will “likely” of “very likely” choose train to reach Ticino for future holidays after the new railway will be available, although it must be noticed that this share of tourists is mainly composed by older respondents owning a general pass for Swiss public transportation (AG). For young couples with children, the comfort and flexibility of car remains of utmost importance.