NEW Investment Options – Golden Visa – Portugal Investor Visa

Golden Visa Residence Card Sample

We are now happy to announce that submissions for the new investment options on Golden Visa are already 100% active and we are now in conditions submit your application. Please check bellow the new options for golden visa which will enlarge the initial ones. For current holders of Golden Visa Residence Permits please note that nothing have changed in regards to your class of investment and you are able to continue your program without any change.

i. Capital transfer with a value equal to or above 1 million Euros; (keeps unchanged)
ii. The creation of, at least, 10 permanent job positions; (now is already working with 10 job positions instead of 30 )
iii. The purchase of real estate property with a value equal to or above 500 thousand Euros; (keeps unchanged)
iv. The purchase of real estate property, with construction dating back more than 30 years or located in urban regeneration areas, for refurbishing, for a total value equal to or above 350 thousand Euros; (new)
v. Capital donation with a value equal to or above 350 thousand Euros for investing in research activities conducted by public or private scientific research institutions involved in the national scientific or technologic system; (new)
vi. Capital donation with a value equal to or above 250 thousand Euros for investing in artistic output or supporting the arts, for reconstruction or refurbishment of the national heritage, through the local and central authorities, public institutions, public corporate sector, public foundations, private foundations of public interest, networked local authorities, local corporate sector organizations, local associations and public cultural associations, pursuing activities of artistic output, and reconstruction or maintenance of the national heritage; (new)
vii. Capital transfer with a value equal to or above 500 thousand Euros, for purchasing shares in investment funds or in venture capital geared to capitalize small and medium companies that, in turn, must present a feasible capitalization plan. (new)

Please note that for areas with less than 100 citizens per Km2 you are now able to perform the investment option iii) with 400.000 Euro or above and option iv) with 280.000 Euro or above.

Our range or options is now enlarged and you can perform your real estate investment from a minimum of 280.000 Euro up to a minimum of 500.000 Euro depending on what type of investment you prefer.

New Regulation in practice also allows you to make any of this investment under a copy name which you can be sole owner or co-ownership as long as your share capital is equivalent to the minimum invested.

For more information or any clarifications do not hesitate to contact us.

Citizenship - Portugal, Golden Visa, Investment, Real Estate - Portugal

Golden Visa Numbers 2014 – Stats for Investor Visa

Investor Visa 2014 in Review

Its easy to make a simple and easy short evaluation of what was the Investor Visa Program during 2014. At this moment all institutions are very happy with the course of this program and Investors are welcome to continue to boost Portuguese economy to leverage the capacity of the Government to revitalize our beautiful country.

The Published Numbers are:

2014 – 1526 Investors Approved

2013 – 424 Investors Approved

2012 – 2 Investors Approved

Number of Family Members Approved

2014 – 2395 Family Members

2013 – 494 Family Members

The Total Investment Generated by this Program:

By Acquiring Real Estate:

1.110.702.081,12 Euro (1.110 million euro)

By Capital Transfer:

117.271.745,77 Euro (117 million euro)

The Total Number of Investors per Type of Investment:

1916 Investors choose Real Estate Option – 95%

103 Investors choose Capital Option – 5%

3 Investors choose to create over 10 Jobs – 0%

Main Nationalities

China: 81%

Brazil: 3%

Russia: 3%

South Africa: 2%

Lebanon: 2%

After seeing the results it is easy to understand that 95% of the Investors choose to purchase Real Estate and elected this option as their preferred, in average they added 1,18 persons to their program which is less than 2 persons per investor and in 1 years the demand for this Golden Visa Program has increased over 350% compared to previous year. The expectation that is 2015 will beat the record of applicants and will reach at least 2000 application successfully approved within one year. The origin of the Investors is clearly dominated by China.

Uncategorized

Immigration Department Inspectors Claim Lack of Staff

Portugal Immigration department inspectors which are responsible to provide Investors Visa ( Golden Visa ) claimed today they are running with too little staff and can not cope with the amount of demand from this program. The Inspectors Union launched a communication where they say the system is fragile because of lack of training to inspectors not allowing them to be able to control well the rules and details of the investment. This week Internal Affairs Ministry announced that the internal procedures inside Immigration Department will be modified to ensure the procedures are performed with best practices avoiding mistakes or delays as such as we have been experiencing the last months.

Inspectors Union refers to all this problem as lack of staff and lack of training with a natural consequence of extra work and overload per each inspector. The conclusions of the last audit to Immigration Department refers to disorganization and lack of clear rules and procedures to process all this applications.

It is already known that the new manual of procedures should be in place within 30 days and after an initial phase of training improvements should start to be noticed. At this current moment they apology for the delay they have been creating in so many applications and expect this issues to be resolved for the near future.

For all our investors which are having their applications in process, please note that quick resolutions are expected soon.

Golden Visa, Real Estate - Portugal

Real Estate Lisbon : What is the reason why we find many unoccupied buildings inside city center?

When visiting Lisbon for the 1st time, lots of Golden Visa Investors query what is the reason behind the fact that several buildings ( Real Estate ) with the best location and where the sqm price is the highest in all Portugal stay unoccupied and totally abandoned?In order to be able to explain that fact to investors, we would like to show a map that was published in 2009 by Lisbon City Hall locating every building in bad conditions and stay unoccupied inside the city. The result is tremendously shocking since it illustrates the fact that are 57.000 buildings in this conditions all over Lisbon.

In areas where sqm price ranges over 4000 Euro, it becomes difficult to understand the reason behind such conditions. It is important to understand that the buildings which are in those conditions are usually centenary buildings which will have to maintain the facade in case of reconstruction and will stay inside with the same division of property and type as the original development. Original development was thought and made more than 100 years ago, however the law restrictions in Portugal forbid the City Hall to change the original design of the building which in most of the cases eradicates the economic interest.

Developing by restoring and old building becomes extremely difficult if the output product to the market is not interesting at all. With time owners of such properties are waiting for conditions to change and for situation to become unsustainable to see if someone has the courage to modify the rules and regulations.

In the meanwhile the buildings are getting destroyed waiting to completely fall apart expecting that one day someone will allow the owners to develop a complete new project.

Another reason which have made several buildings remain is such poor conditions is the fact that lots of tenants with old contracts still remain renting those properties with ridiculous rents (some even under 50 euro / month) which is even less than annual tax the property owners are required to pay to Government. Being unable to change the rent price, only updated by price index (under 2% a year) it does not give an incentive to property owners to maintain in proper conditions the building structure. Those property owners are waiting for buildings to have extremely bad conditions to live in expectancy that tenants will move out so that they can have their assets restored and back into the market with proper rental income.

Those rental laws were gladly changed 2 years ago and within a period of 5 years is expected to have this problem almost erased. In five to ten years time you will have lots of old properties restored and back into the market in proper conditions, eliminating this fear factor for Golden Visa investors which have hard time to understand why so many old buildings unoccupied or badly maintained are polluting Lisbon global image. Some want to me positive and say this is Lisbon charm, gladly the charm of Lisbon will change to sophisticated in a couple of years.

Golden Visa, Investment, Real Estate - Portugal

Portugal Golden Visa : How to invest in a Vineyard in Portugal with 500.000 Euro ?

If you are a Wine lover and always had a dream of owning your own vineyard and cultivate grapes, investing in a Portuguese vineyard might be the investment you were looking for. In Portugal most of wine production comes out of boutique wine labels and is known for extremely good quality even though market price for wine in Portugal is still very affordable.

With the expertise on wine lasting for several generations, in Portugal is still easy to purchase a vineyard that with a little bit of marketing and export sales, can generate a good return on investment, able to grow at a much faster speed than global economy.

The question is whether you are able to invest 500.000 Euro in a vineyard and still be able to apply for Residence Permit / Citizenship with that investment? The answer is pretty simple, yes you can but most of vineyards business is allocated to a company and not exactly just a piece of property. In order to be able to be granted residence permit with your investment in a Portugal vineyard you need to choose between one of the following options:

Option 1)

Purchase real estate of the vineyard in a value of 500.000 Euro or bigger to your personal name and then purchase the shares / stocks of the vineyard separately. This way you will be able to apply for Residence Permit in Portugal for the fact that you have invested over 500.000 Euro in Real Estate and you still will own the vineyard business in a separate way.

Option 2)

You purchase the shares of the vineyard for the total value over 1 million euro instead of 500.000 Euro, since you are making a capital investment instead of real estate acquisition. Even if the company you are purchasing is itself owner of real estate in total value over 500.000 Euro. Please note that all capital transactions under 1.000.000 Euro will not be able to be considered for Residence Permit application.

It is also common that most of vineyards in good conditions in Portugal will have an asking price over 1.000.000 Euro and this can also make your business easier. Just be aware that when you acquire a company you are also assuming the full debts of the business and therefore is strongly advised that you perform a good due diligence to all company activities.

Vineyards in Portugal is a protected business since its required to have license to explore vineyards, buying a company that holds a license is definitely your best way. For checking opportunities on Portuguese vineyards please email us with your investment budget.

Citizenship - Portugal, Golden Visa, Real Estate - Portugal

Golden Visa : Buying Real Estate Off-plan or in Development

Portugal Golden Visa application states that you are able to apply for Residence Permit if you make an investment in Real Estate over 500.000 Euro. That investment can be for several properties or just one. All types of properties are able to be considered for the application, such as, lands, plots, residential properties, industrial properties or commercial properties, rural lands, parking lots or agriculture lands.

However and due to the fact that several investors in Portugal are looking at properties which are still in development, many query us if we are able to use a purchase of a property off plan or in development in order to apply for Golden Visa?

The answer for that question is a straight forward yes, however several conditions need to be considered before choosing this option. In order to be able to do this kind of procedure the investor needs to open an escrow account in the bank with the total value of the investment, exceeding the amount of 500.000 Euro and stating that money will be given to developer at the time of final deed. To set up this procedure is quite simple as long as you have an experienced immigration lawyer taking care of the procedure, but you still need to be aware that Visa application after being approved is issued for 1 year and after 1 year all the purchase needs to be complete.

What happens if my investment off-plan is not complete after 1 year?

You will not be able to use that investment to renew your visa and consequently you will not be able to count your 1st year as one of the 6 you need to be able to apply for citizenship.

Even though it is possible to apply for a Golden Visa using an escrow account and with a project off-plan / in development property, it is strongly advised to avoid this solution. You need to be fully confidence that you will be able to make the final deed before the end of your visa expiration date and most of the time this is not only dependent on conclusion of the development but also in the several authorizations the developer has to require in order to get the usage license. Sometimes this developments stay pending for the simple fact that outside developments are the responsibility of city hall which might time long time to finish everything.

Portugal Investor Visa

Citizenship and Residence Permit by Investment – info@portugalinvestorvisa.com – Phone: +351 914976018 – Portugal

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