Doing the renewal appointment without a lawyer

Residencies & citizenships Portugal Golden Visa 🇵🇹
1

First, I live full-time in Portugal and am overdue for my third renewal. For God-and-AIMA knows what reason, I am not eligible for online “automatic” renewal. Since April I have been sending 5 emails per day to various SEF and AIMA addresses, as well as occasional registered letters. After around 400 emails, they finally read one. Last week I got a call from AIMA asking to confirm that I still want an appointment. Well, duh. The next day I received an email with November appointment dates for me and my wife.

Now the question remains whether I need my lawyer. There are several reasons I;m unsatisfied with them. Of course, it was my own action that got the appointments. My spoken Portuguese is more than good enough to handle the meeting. My main question is what paperwork do I need, other than the obvious FBI report and marriage certificate, both for my wife. I have the receipts to prove the 14 days residency. Do they ask for a copy of the deed to prove that I still own the investment property? My lawyer holds onto that.

If I can do the appointment myself (like all the D7 people do), it saves me 1500 euros and the exasperation of begging for my lawyer’s attention.

At my previous appointments, my lawyer made me sit in the waiting area while she presented a stack of papers to the officer and called me over just to do the photo and fingerprints. So I have no idea what papers they required.

Has anyone here done a RENEWAL appointment, whether alone or sitting beside your lawyer, and can guide me through the process?

(FYI, I have applied for nationality, which will take another 2 years), and may or may not apply for permanent residency, since I have the language certificate, but this is not my question).

2

I cannot comment on the renewal experience as I have not passed that stage yet, but I would recommend you get hold of the original deed document (escritura) regardless of the GV process.
It’s fine for your lawyer to keep a copy I suppose.

Officially, escritura is listed as part of the renewal requirements (refer to SEF ARI Manual, p. 28).

3

I also don’t know from personal experience (still waiting on pre-approval—lol), but I have heard that you may need an updated bank declaration confirming the investment. (This is one of the reasons people have advised against closing the original bank account for the duration of the ARI process.)

4

for the RE path, the bank’s declaration is only required once at the initial appointment, not at subsequent renewals. That’s according to the same SEF ARI Manual.