This has been solved
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For ManifestaĆ§Ć£o de interesse, I agree with Aima. The reason is that the MI people have not made any clear connection to the country. They entered as a tourist. Hence they could leave in anytime. It is 100% different for GV where investors have to make down payment of 500k. Hence asking the investors who already invested 500k to update docs is a genius tactic. And now all of sudden, after updating the docsc the GV investors find themselves at the bottom of the lineš. Thatās what I thought about it too. But i did not write it here because any bad prediction about AIMA could be deleted in this forum. Therefore, once again, my hat off to Aimaās tactic. They are genius!
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Having just spent time in Lisbon, none of the immigration woes surprise me AT ALL 
Semana proxima, proxima semanaā¦INDEED
Refreshing this for the new people:
Iām thinking of a country thatās been in the news lately. This countryās government unfairly blames immigrants. This countryās government treats immigrants with disrespect, sometimes even without basic human dignity. This countryās government fails to uphold the legal rights of immigrants. This country isā¦?
Portugal! What, you thought I was talking about a different country? 
Donāt jump out of the frying pan into the fire.
I donāt endorse the views of the gentleman who wrote this article. In my opinion and personal experience (having waited for 3 years without even pre-approval and no end in sight even after updating all the documents which are expiring in a week), AIMA is the first worldās most proficient, efficient and humane immigration agency (especially for investors). So, what if the pending ARI applications have more than doubled from 20k to 50k in 1 year with a 350 member task force working round the clock to address backlogs; AIMA still rocks. My real estate investment and productive business activity in Portugal contributing to itās economy can all go to hell.
@live2learn - I incorporated the company only after AIMAās January committment to conclude the pending ARI applications. Made a mistake, i agree. At some point, even I will choose to cut losses. Incidentally, my relationship manager has taken more than 3 months to open the company bank account even though whatever documents were requested including business plan, source of funds, etc were provided within 3 days of request. But the bankās response time to any mail exceeds 10 working days (i.e. when they are not on vacation), so much so that āCertidao do Registo Comercialā with a 3 month validity expired and I had to get a new one issued. So, much so that the preparation of account opening documents could not be concluded during the entire 3 weeks I was in Europe and now she expects me to travel back again to sign documents in person at bank branch. I think the problem is that in some countries, there is a genuine belief that salary is not something that is earned, it is a birth right. Lawyers, agency staff, judiciary, bank staff, suppliers, prospective employees all seem to hold this same belief.
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Now you are just about to experience the banking issue. It has always been another hell. I opened a bank account in Portugal in 2019/2020, it already took more than 1 month for the compliance check!!! Now banks can close accounts for various reasons: resident card expired; your original countries in grey/black list; or simple they send you email saying that they decide to stop prividing services to youā¦
There is another thread about banking issueā¦
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I donāt think much can be expected from AIMA.
@Hippopotamousse - no amount of awareness will help a prospective investor from falling victim to the marketers of the program. The lawyers, consultants simply say that it is taking 18-24 months to get the first card (due to covid, ukraine war) but AIMA and govt. are working to streamline the whole process, recently GV application processing has started and there is committment to clear backlog in 3 months, recently Portugal has even been awarded 1st, 2nd or 3rd best destination for golden visa residency. Once the investors part with their money, then only the reality dawns slowly over every single step of the process and it continues long after the first card is issued. It is not a 2 year journey. It is a lifetime pain.
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Demand for PTGV keeps going up because there is no such similar program in EU i.e. non tax resident + minimum physical requirement and ability to apply for nationality.
If you were AIMA, would you change anything to the current program?
If I were AIMA, I would not change or make any improvement. Why would I change anything? Itās been a golden goose or a money printing machine since the beginning. I will never touch or change anything if the business runs well. No modification needed!
Only change or improvement needs to be considered if the demand drops down significantly which is not the case here.
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The problem with the Portugal Golden Visa program is not the program itself ā if anything, its terms, taken at face value, are too attractive relative to every other investment migration program.
The problem with the Portugal Golden Visa is the Portuguese government, which has no incentive to truly reform the program, AIMA, IRN, or the legal system unless / until, as you mention, applicant volumes drop significantly.
I donāt have all the answers on how to reduce applicant volumes, but I do know that it doesnāt happen if people like you and I stay silent, in which case there is no voice to counteract the army of lawyers and promoters who constantly talk up the program, and the media who amplify their every word.
Plus, I empathize with the plight of everyone who is now facing extreme conditions in their home countries and seeks a better life for themselves and their families via legitimate means. If they havenāt invested or applied yet, their timing is very late. But for many, it could also be the case that the reason for their late timing is not lack of foresight, but, as was my case, they simply did not yet have sufficient money to invest at the time before this program became overcrowded and AIMA completely dysfunctional.
If our words can save one person or one family from making this terrible mistake, then itās all worthwhile to me. And the fact that trolls are falsely reporting our posts as abusive indicates that we may actually be making a difference.
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@Hippo, my friend! If I am still breathing by the time my first resident permit is received, let us catch up over a cup of coffee in a nice cafe in Sagres on a sunny day. Brunch on me!
Else, I will take this hatred towards AIMA to the next life and beyond.
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From the article:
As of 2025, investors can reasonably expect the entire processāfrom application to obtaining a passportāto take approximately six years.
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The article isnāt wrong either, if you look at the bell curve there are exceptions where the citizenship was offered at 6 Years or even at 5.5 years but those are just outliers. Realistically it is 7-8 years on a median but there are other exceptions who havenāt managed to get it even after 9 years.
After reading through the whole section I do understand the frustrations of people going through in GV program, I went through several months of anxiety too but it is nothing compared to the one i have been in the US. If I have to choose something between bad (Portugal) and worse (US) again, would choose the ābadā option at any point of timeā¦
Well the intent of the article is not right and phrasing meant to mislead. The excuse they want to give to any new applicant on follow up is that since the citizenship clock starts from date of application of GV, u need not worry about any delays in GV processing (but this itself may change depending on new regulations or guidance given by the governments in power in future, 7-8 years is too long a time frame to assume things will remain same). The message given in this article is that more the delay in ur first resident card the better it is for applicant. It is just a ploy to avoid accountability. Currently, the wait for 1st card is endless. No pre-approvals since feb-24 and whosoever got it, was through successful lawsuit only. And till the time u dont have residency in place, u cant apply for citizenship either. Plus there is no reliability, AIMA stops processing of GV applications at itās own convenience and whims. Cards are issued with wrong details, renewals are a further pain and citizenship applications are taking no less than 3 years currently. I am not aware of any outlier data point with 5.5 years tag w.r.t to the bell curve u r referring. But for future citiznship applications, 95% data points will definitely fall within 9-10 years bracket. AIMAās backlog today will become another departmentās backlog for citizenship processing. 400k other migrant applicants including cplp and 50k gv applicants all applying for citizenship around the same time. There wont be even appointments for arranging CDT. It is going to be another mess.
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Iāve also mentioned this next storm coming, which is conveniently ignored by the PT GV hucksters. IRN (or whatever we have in 3-5 yearsā time) will be overwhelmed. Language certifications will be overwhelmedā¦
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Portugal Receives Over 63,000 Citizenship Applications in First 4 Months of 2024.
Exactly. So, in addition to GV applications pending for 2022 onward applicants for last 3 years with no resolution in sight and complete ignorance by AIMA; already the backlog for citizenship processing exceeds 2 years. For citizenship, AIMA will be overwhelmed with CDT requests, language programs with A2 certification course requests and IRN with citizenship requests. The competence and number of staff all remaining same, i dont know on what basis any improvement can be expected. 7 years for citizenship?? We will be lucky if it happens even over 15 years.
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There are several tools to reduce the backlog of citizenshipās application:
- Language requirement: it is the easiest one to implement. The tendency of EU is to increase the language requirment as a concrete proof to show how well the immigrants can integrate into the society. Some countries have raised the requirement. The most recent one is France. Now to renew residencies in France, you need A2/B1 depending on type of your residencies. To obtain french citizenship, B2 is required!
- Modifying citizenshipās law: It used to be 6 years. Then was changed to 5 years. And last year the new initial time count was added. They can either change from 5 years to 7-8 years (totally possible as UK already raised from 5 to 10 years) or stop the new inital time count or implement both plus the increment of language certificate.
- Physical requirement/ tax contribution/ monthly income: now there is no tax requirement for citizenshipās application. There is also no job/income requirement in the country before/during/after applying. They can surely these as knobs to control the input/output.
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All this when just over last 1 year, at portugal gdp of 308 billion usd or 280 billion euro, i believe north of approx. 4.5 billion euro of investments through portugal gv from just new applicants would have come in 2024. That is a significant contribution for a small number of participants and does not even include those GV applicants who are already there and contributing through multiple other means including travel or business or taxes. That is exactly why i agree when u said that portuguese government and media will continue to villify the investors but not close the program while not taking any decision on existing GV processesā¦even though majority of the GV applicants have nothing to do with increase in housing crisis or any kind of money laundering/ financial frauds anywhere. Technically, portugal would be in recession for last 3 years without last 3 years of GV investments.
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Great points. Many of us are so focused on our current suffering that we fail to imagine how things could get even worseā¦ 
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And they will.