In this paper, I ask whether age norms affect the decision to leave the family nest in Italy, and whether this association depends on a system of perceived costs and benefits, parental approval of their children’s decisions, and the quality of parent-child relationships. The panel component of Family and Social Subject data (2003 and 2007) was used to understand whether perceived age norms (in the first wave) are connected to the decision to leave the parental home in the later wave. The Inverse Mills’ ratio was included in logit and multinomial logit models, in order to account for social selection biases. The results show that a perceived norm that one should stay at home for longer is negatively correlated with the likelihood of leaving the parental home in order to marry. This association is affected by the perceived benefits of leaving home and parental approval of children choices. Perceived parental disapproval reduces the influence of normative factors on individual actual behaviors, regardless of the quality of parent-child relationships. Overall, Italian young adults tend to comply with age norms when they perceive that their decision will imply benefits and/or a violation will lead to penalties.