At the end of the contract the landlord either cultivates his land himself or leases it, repaying to the improver part of the expenditure incurred by him.
Special contracts, known as colonie immovibili and colonie tern poranee are applied to the latifondi or huge estates, the owners of which receive half the produce, except that of the vines, olive-trees and woods, which he leases separately.
At Les Daces (which he sold in 1765) he had become a householder on no small scale; at Ferney (which he increased by other purchases and leases) he became a complete country gentleman, and was henceforward known to all Europe as squire of Ferney.
Other forms of contract are the piccola mezzadria, or sub-letting by tenants to under-tenants, on the half-and-half system; enfiteusi, or perpetual leases at low rentsa form which has almost died out; and mezzadria (in the provinces of Caserta and Benevento).
The terms of agrarian contracts and leases (except in districts where mezzadria prevails in its essential form), are in many regions disadvantageous to the laborers, who suffer from the obligation to provide guarantees for payment of rent, for repayment of seed corn and for the division of products.