Portugal Golden Visa - The New Law of 2023

Residencies & citizenships Portugal Golden Visa 🇵🇹
1038

If it is a useful data point, we got our utente numbers pre-covid, using our investment address with an in-person visit to the local admin facility. That was not the Centro de Saude for our address, as paperwork matters were transferred to the admin facility. In theory it could have been done online via email, but the email went to the person we eventually sat down with, and she had on the order of 5,000 unopened emails. One had to take a number; there were 10 given out each morning and afternoon, first come first served.

I assumed coverage was part of the much higher fees associated with GV rather than D7.

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1039

Nope, those fees only earn you the contempt of the government.

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1040

So what you need to show in SNS center? Only the fact you applied to GV before end of 2021?

And how do you show it then, just open the ARI SEF site or you have other means to prove it?

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1041

So the EU has been talking about a common Long term residence permit for third country nationals with the only group excluded from the scheme being those who hold a residence permit solely on the basis of an investment scheme in any of the Member States (aka Golden visa holders). This basically lets you become a Long term resident of the EU as a whole (excl. Ireland and Denmark) instead of a single country.

I wonder with the GV is being turned into a Special D2, would this make the holders of a “Special D2” eligible for the EU Long term residence permit? It would depend on the text specific to the legislation of course, however, I am curious on what other people’s take on this is.

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1042

This has been discussed a little bit in a related thread. I think it is not known at this point whether that EU wide long term residency permit would apply.

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1043

Your are assuming they will issue permits under the proposed legislation. If you read it closely, there are no guarantees or statement like “will be issued” or " is renewed." It just states those with applications “will remain valid” and is silent on any further work or issuance in new article 45 and the “posssibility of renewing” in new article 44. These are two very different phrasings than the current article 90-A paragraph 2 which states,“IS RENEWED for a period of two years”.

In my and other analysis the victory everyone thought they had with the new Articles in the “More Housing Law” could be very hollow after further analysis of the exact wording compared to previous wording.

Not to mention the delay we will all see based on the new law. It took 6 years from 2007 to 2013 for ARI applications written in law in 2007 to be accepted and start processing.

Sorry to burst your bubble, but the battle is not won.

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1044

@syrenity The Despacho I linked prior specifies the documents you may need to show to demonstrate your residence rights. I summarize for ease of reference:
a) evidence of initial application on the SEF electronic platform; OR
b) confirmation of a SEF appointment scheduled; OR
c) confirmation of a SEF appointment attended (“recibo comprovativo”)

I would also recommend printing out the Despacho itself.

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1045

Joel is right. There are weaknesses, contradictions and ambiguities in the draft legislation. We need the drafts to be tightened up in committee - otherwise we will end up with a highly uncertain environment, relying on the goodwill and the whims of government agencies.

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1046

If you live in Lisbon write to lxinscroes email ID. I got a very polite email back basically saying ‘all u furriners did not apply for the number until u needed it for vaccine’. We were directed to the illegal immigrant line for the shot and given a pink card and sent off to our local health centre with that where they issued a temporary number which worked for the next 18 mos till they sent the permanent by email.

1047

Thanks, can I also use the SEF biometrics for attendance for getting a local mobile number?

1048

What is lxinscroes?

1049

You can just get a local SIM card at the airport on arrival … no proof of residence required.

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1050

I’ve been wondering the same thing

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1051

Is it preserved, or expires after a while?

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1052

Vodafone or whoever will let you keep on paying for phone service as long as you want.

It’s just a business transaction, not a government granted privilege.

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1053

See Postpaid or prepaid cellphone plans

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1054

If I remember correctly, there were a few lawsuits where ARI applicants took SEF to court and won over unreasonably long delays. Perhaps based on such precedents, a class action against the SEF might work, forcing them to clear its entire backlog in a responsable amount of time?

I’d still wait for the more housing bill to pass first however. Given that there is still a bit of uncertainty in the air.

Lastly, I know this sounds a bit over optimistic, but perhaps we could try and lobby to turn the more housing bill into a win. As the ARI is being terminated, we should try and lobby for explicitly including in the legislation that pending applications are to be processed by the SEF within the next few months. This would make sense for the government too given they want to be done with the ARI and having pending applications be approved up to 2 years after terminating a programme doesn’t really reflect well on a termination.

Just a wild thought. Open to opinions.

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1055

absolutely the current draft still have tons of ambiguities and definitely create more room for government agencies to hold back on GV. Based on current draft it’s not possible for a typical GV holder to renew after the first D2 visa, unless agencies break the law (like ignoring D2 legal requirement of setting up companies, require to maintain an accommodation and health insurance which there’s no specific legal wavier for GV investors)

YET most immigration lawyers and real estate agents focus on urging people to apply on last chance! creating more awareness on these issue only scare away potential customers! So there’s not enough awareness among existing GV investors on the potential risk on D2 conversion.

That mean we existing GV investors need to do more to raise the awareness of the issue. Hopefully that can force government to amend the draft. I wish we can have another round of signature, or even placing some ads on newspapers, to focus on:

  1. Making Special D2 renewal right specifically written in the law (current draft there’s no right to renewal!)
  2. Removing maintaining residence requirement (I think it’s a easy sell - otherwise GV investors need to rent a place without actually living to satisfy the requirement)
  3. Specifically writing that existing real-estate/fund investment would satisfy the requirement for entrepreneurial projects (so there’s no further uncertainty of having government agencies rejecting by saying real estate investment is not entrepreneurial)

We can’t just wait until the law pass and problem occur - there’s no class action in Portugal, that mean by then each of us have to sue government separately and not even guarantee we will 100% win. let’s do something NOW before we eventually need to do even more.

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1056

@Potententcatalyst is making one of the many points that are coming to light in some analysis being done. Here is another specific one that will impact EVERY ARI/Golden Visa investor whether you have a residence permit or just applying:

  1. Under new Artice 44 paragraph 5 all renewals will be converted to a residence permit for Entrepreneurial Immigrants in the terms of No. 4 of Article 89 of Law no. 23/2007 of 4 July in is current wording.

  2. No. 4 of Article 89 in its current wording states, “A residence permit is granted to a third party national who develops an entrepreneurial project, including the creation of an innovative based company, integrated in a certified incubator under the terms definied by an ordinance from the members of the government responsible for the areas of internal administration and economy…”

  3. Paragraph 3 of Article 45 (which applies to new applicants) states, "the requests referenced in the preceding paragraphs (i.e. applications that “remain valid” and requests that are pending procedures of prior control in the municipalities) are applied with the necessary adaptations (not defined) in paragraph 5 of Article 44. This is no. 2 above.

So that means all applications and renewals of existing residence permits will go before the competent authorities as defined in paragraph 4 and 5 of new Article 55 which are:

a) The Agência para o Investimento e Comércio Externo de Portugal, E. P. E; (The Agency for Investment and Foreign Trade of Portugal, E.P.E)
b) Banco de Fomento; (Development Bank)
c) The Agency for Competitiveness and Innovation, I. P. E;
d) The National Innovation Agency (ANI);
e) The Office of Cultural Strategy, Planning and Assessment (GEPAC);
f) Others that prove appropriate due to the subject matter.

Has any dealt with these authorities for your residential or commercial property purchase or rehabilitation project on a commercial building, let alone investing the appropriate amount of funds in equities?

Why is SEF or is successor AAMMP not specifically called out???..Oh, right these agencies approve Entrepreneurial Immigrant Residence Permits not ARI permits? Where in the law does it give these authorities the power to approve a real estate investment for an Entrepreneurial Immigrant visa which does not fit the definition in Article 98 No.4 (number 2 above)

In other words, we are a square peg the Government of Prime Minister Costa is proposing to try and stick in a round hole, which means are applications and renewals will all stop because there is no law or decree that states they will move forward without complying with Article 98 no. 4.

We will all have to eventually go to court to enforce our rights under the protection of the confidenence of trust in the actions of the government at the times we made our investments. Another FYI, it takes 1-4 years to get to an actual hearing at the first court level on your case in Portugal right now. If you need to appeal that takes another 1-3 years and so on.

Everyone needs to stop worrying about when their pre-approval and biometric date will be and realize the Government is trying to stop all of us from getting any permits in the way the new Article 44 and Article 45 are written.

Now is the time to call your lawyers and ARI advisors and demand they call all of their friends and acquaintances who are connected to the political parties or SEF and demand a negative note on the first reading on May 19 or make massive amendments during the committee hearings.

10,000-15,000+ law suits from ARI Investors/GV applicants will seize their court system and while that happens our investments will be frozen in a foreign country which could go bankrupt (do they have $7Billion dollars laying around to pay us back) because under Article 22 of the Constitution if we win the Portuguese Republic must pay us compensation.

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1057

I agree that there seems to be some handwaving about how these new rules are not actually retroactively changing the playing field. I have sent some questions to my fund to ask them to push the government for clarity as well. My lawyers are not really being all that helpful.

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