The newspapers are selling. But what the President said last week and in this recent interview, is that he has questions about how the draft law he has seen can be implemented - eg definition of an empty house (based on ālowā energy consumption), who will identify these empty houses, who will renovate them etc. The municipalities donāt have the money to do this.
No point in making laws that cannot be implemented. He commented that when he has the draft law, he would assess it or have the Constitutional Court assess its constitutionality on certain points.
His alerts essentially give the Govt. forewarning and time to ensure that certain points in the draft law are not unconstitutional and that everyone has thought through the detail of how it can be implemented.
As Chris says he can veto, and send back to Parliament for precision (happened on the euthanasia bill). At no time did he mention ARI.
The draft legislation should be available at the Council of Ministers meeting on the 30th, and thereafter be set for Parliamentary discussion. After any amendments, it will go to the President. And yes, he signs the final bill into law.
And itās good to know that Marceloās background is PSD i.e. of the centre-right - he could be our saviourā¦
But the comments donāt really relate to the GV termination, do they?
They donāt, and thereās no lost love for GV anywhere in the government, including with Marcelo.
While this may end up being further delayed by the parliament to meet Marceloās demands, itās clear that the government needs to pass a housing package (even if the existing package is woefully ineffective), and they also have a goal of ending GV (be it from voter or EU pressure).
As to the specifics of the termination, it may evolve along with changes to the rest of the housing plan, or it may stay the same.
As expected, the municipalities have entered their submission on the proposals, with contributions largely related to planning consents and local taxes. Nothing specific on GV mentioned here.
Former president Cavaco Silva voiced an opinion I believe that many here share - which is to say that the housing situation can best be solved by increasing the supply of housing with the cooperation of private investors. Many people here invested in ARI and have followed the path set forth by law to invest in real estate or funds. There was no condition that the funds support low income housing. But why not? The government modified the program only a year ago but did not see fit to make this alteration? If housing is a problem now, was it not a problem then also? Donāt blame the investors who only followed the law. Now is the chance to right this wrong. Instead of eliminating the golden visa, continue it and allow future investment to increase the supply of housing notably for lower income Portuguese people. But it is unfair to retroactively harm investors who followed the rules.
In support of this, the former president also said:
"As the Governmentās record of the last seven years is not positive in terms of fulfilling promises made, the new housing program suffers from the problem of credibility inherent in the policies of the current executive. In addition to the lack of credibility, there is another factor inherent in the current Government that calls into question the practical effectiveness of the programme. Itās about the trust factor. Throughout the seven years in power, the Government has done its best to erode investor confidence,"
Building āaffordable housingā just makes housing more expensive for everyone not subsidized
The best affordable housing is building more, it helps everyone. But I suppose what heās saying is better than nothing for the folks here, just not great from my yimby pov
Housing: Marcelo considers that the Government plan is āinoperableā (postsen.com)
Marcelo criticized government housing policies. Opposition liked to hear | Housing (postsen.com)
Please wait for 15 seconds for the article to appear once you open the web page.
Madeira may have some autonomy but I donāt think they can issue their own Residency Visas, can they?
Well, this is so-called ājournalismā.
Has some entertainment value, but I hope you donāt expect any factual reporting there?
When you see statements like this āFollowing a wider package of measures to tackle the housing crisis, authorities in Portugal abolished the Golden Visa Program on February 16.ā - what do you think about the author of this article?
By now, ājournalismā is a runner-up to āpoliticsā! 
"Mercan Properties presents measures to maintain Gold Visas in the tourism sector
Canadian promoter has 1.1 billion euros invested in Portugal through this program and wants to see implemented measures that can be reconciled with the objectives of the Governmentās āMore Housingā program."
Mercan Propertiesā projects captured the interest of 2,500 foreign investors, of which more than 1,200 made an investment in 2022, with the Canadian promoter responsible for raising 50% of the investment via the Vistos Gold program in the non-residential commercial market.
They are probably talking about visas granted rather than applications, but it is interesting data nonetheless. Mercan has been in PT for 7 years and has had 2,500 investors in that time, but HALF were in 2022, AND they were responsible for half of all visas for this non residential pathway.
If they are talking about granted visas, things are only going to get worse before they get better. Half of all Mercan investors received their visas last year?! They must have many times that in applications in various stagesā¦
Woke up to this news yesterday. We bought a quinta in the Alentejo 8 months ago and submitted to SEF in September 2022. Was on the phone with our lawyer yesterday. He gave the same opinionās in the article. Namely that people who had the primary submission with SEF before 16th February were fine as Portuguese law only looks āforwardā and not ābackwardsā were his words. He did mention the worst case being that I would need to rent my property for 3 years and that after 30th March, things will be much clearer. That being said, canāt help feeling cheated. The housing crisis argument doesnāt hold up and furthermore, Iād think it would be simple to spot the investors who bought for their families future. Iām South African, so needed an option for my kids. It would be quite clear from my bank statements/investments that my investment made up a large portion of my wealth and it was not earned corruptly. Get the popcorn out. This is going to be a rollercoasterā¦
You woke up to something new, or just hadnāt heard about the general turmoil since Feb 26?
Nothing new, just the turmoil. After getting all my documents into SEF last year, I stopped following info on the GV and concentrated on other stuff until a friend who has bought a property, but not yet submitted docs, told me about the proposed changes.
I hate to be the bearer of bad news Darien, but itās 5 years forced rental that has been proposed - not 3 
!
But, hopefully, this whole scenario is a bad storm in a tea cup, and this will end up fizzling out very shortly. 
