Everyones lawyers have said that, but it remains to be seen what exactly is considered āretroactiveā. Fingers crossed.
Not sure why anyone would tempt fate with a real estate investment now, though.
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Ohbee, I encourage you to read the comprehensive and well founded opinion from Dr. Gouveia, one of the top constitutionalists in Portugal, posted on the Parliamentary Committee web-site for the āMore Housingā law. I have attached in EN after Chris converted it from PT.
This document not only gives President Marcelo the cover to bounce whatever gets passed by Parliament to the Constitutional Court, but also gives any of us a roadmap to take it there. Also it gives the Constitutional Court a roadmap for a ruling against any retroactive effects of this law. There are also may other legal avenues to pursue as well, so people are not stuck. You are scaring people thinking there money is locked up and/or they have lost it. That is not OK, under the rule of law of Portugal nor the EU.
This is not the US, where the Supreme Court can get an ideological bent from generation to generation based on the case law/tort law system the US has.
To that end, whatever anyone invested in before the law passed based on the principle of non-retroactivity as enshrined in Article 18 of the Constitution of the Republic of Portugal will be fine in the end or the government will have to compensate them.
JBGouveia-Opinion-ENG-DeepL.pdf (810.3 KB)
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To add to what @joelvogel stated, not everyone can afford a ā¬500K fund investment or want to deal with the PFIC side of things. For many the ā¬280K and ā¬350K real estate options that will soon go away are the only realistic paths to the GV.
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It will be interesting to see if any Russians apply this to their potentially rejected renewals!
People wouldnāt have lost their money, they just might be stuck with a house or fraction of a hotel they need to sell. Which may be at a loss if the government takes away all real estate related options. Know anyone who wants to own a fraction of a hotel in Portugal without the associated GV benefits?
It seems illogical to me to encourage people to rush into this process right now, given the ongoing (and probable future) changes. As well as the insane wait times.
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I am awaiting pre-approval so I am stuck, but I had a few colleagues at work ask me if they should do this and the only fair answer I could give them was that I could not advise it based on what I have learned, primarily on this forum. So Iām in the camp that it is highly risky for most people to do this. Only if you are basically comfortable not having access to the money for 10 years and donāt really NEED the citizenship. Thatās my 2 cents.
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Ohbee,
It is clear you did not take the time to read the opinion or educate yourself which would change your negative and scared opinions.
Let me correct the record based on what is included.
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The Russian and Belorussians who apply or try to renew using this opinion will be summarily denied, because part of Article 18 of the Constitution states that rights can be denied and applied retroactivity if allowed by the constitution. The constitution allows this through the application of EU law and sanctions that are in place to which Portugal is subject (Article 8 and other Articles of the Constitution)
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You also did not read that people who have invested and are impacted by ANY retroactive changes , have recourse to the state for the monetary damages they may suffer by said acts of the state. These are enshrined as Protection of Confidence of the State as derived from Article 2 of the Constitution and Liability of Public Entities as outlined in Article 22. Especially because such acts could never have been foreseen, such as this radically change to the ARI investment scheme in light of those items in my #1 above.
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People need to educate themselves on the issues and research their options and make their own decisions. Those based on the comments of people who have clearly not done their homework on such a complex issue is never good, but I would not want to be someone who contributed to their misfortune. For instance, did you look and research that again today the PS party has posted an entirely new draft to the Parliamentary Committee web-site that goes further in their reversal of their original statements by the Costa PS Government against the Golden Visa and their desired retroactive effect to the first announcement in 2023. How times change from just February (a mere 3-4 months ago).
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As to the insane wait time those are also addressed in the legal opinion from Dr. Gouveia, who raises that as substantial problem infringing on peopleās rights under the Constitution including GV applications. These are outlined in Article 13 and Article 15 of the Constitution which Dr. Gouveia supports with great logic and foundation going back to the original writing of the Constitution in 1975 and many of the precepts included at that time based on the constitution written by/for Germany after World War II which included the latest thinking on the rights of humans, not citizens, but humans.
If you are applying, you might want to read it to educate yourself on at least some of such a fundamental document written at such a pivotal time in modern Portuguese history.
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Ah, so there are exceptions to the retroactive changes policy. And people should be cautious before rushing into this.
We are in perfect agreement.
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@joelvogel great summary & information. Unfortunately, I donāt think youāll change @ohbee 's mind as they have been very negative on the GV program for some time if you look at their other responses. At least this helps others understand the facts to balance the information.
I personally believe that if the GV program makes sense to potential applicants to move forward assuming they find the right investment which fits their risk profile. Itās also good to have an out clause in the contract as Iāve seen many agreements which have this standard.
The fact that the ruling party has walked back their initial position shows there is support for the program sufficient to move the needle with the government. It has injected a huge sum of money to the country which would be hard to cut-off.
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Another change today? Can you link it? Thatās much more worthwhile discussion than everyone yelling at each other 
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This is the link to the parliamentary site for the bill. At the bottom of the page (C1 through C22) are the submissions by the various parties. The key one is C19, which is the latest draft by PS, the governing party. All the amendments are by reference to the original draft which is the pdf linked to at the top of the page.
Itās been stressed to me, and become obvious, that this is a moving target. PS is so far on its third draft, and PSD has submitted a number of drafts of their own. We are in a bit of a process of ping-pong between the parties. So donāt get too wedded to any particular formulation of the wording.
https://www.parlamento.pt/ActividadeParlamentar/Paginas/DetalheIniciativa.aspx?BID=152805
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Seems todayās change specifically calls out the investments subject to verification of suitability, which are:
i) Transfer of capital in an amount equal to or greater than 1.5 million euros;
iii) Acquisition of real estate with a value equal to or greater than (Euro) 500 000; and
iv) Acquisition of real estate, the construction of which has been completed at least 30 years ago or located in an urban rehabilitation area and carrying out rehabilitation works on the acquired real estate, in a global amount equal to or greater than (Euro) 350 000;
Am I reading this correctly? What then of the other categories, such as funds? No change from current law?
Under the PS proposals so far:
- no new applications for the categories you listed (paragraphs (i), (iii) and (iv) of the Article 3(1)(d) definitions)
- no new applications for āinvestment fundsā (contained in paragraph (vii)) but venture capital funds still OK
Then Articles 44 and 45 single out capital transfers and real estate, stating that applications backed by those investments āremain validā.
The missing piece at the moment is investment funds, which are struck out for new applications, but donāt seem āprotectedā in Article 44/45. Iām assured by Portuguese lawyers that this kind of thing will be cleaned up during the ongoing drafting process.
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Makes far more sense. Thanks. Looking forward to seeing what other loose ends they tie up.
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Do you know the difference between āinvestment fundsā and āventure capital fundsā from the point of view of the Portugal law? For example, I am invested into EQTY and Impacto, both of which are private funds, and both of which I think have some exposure to venture capital and some exposure to property development (in fact, that is precisely why I chose these funds, to diversity the exposure).
You can look up specific funds on the CMVM website to learn their classification.
āVenture capital fundsā are the funds listed here: https://web3.cmvm.pt/sdi/capitalrisco/pesquisa_nome_fcr.cfm
āInvestment fundsā are the funds listed here: https://web3.cmvm.pt/sdi/fundos/app/pesquisa_nome_fundos_shp.cfm?nome=&src=shp
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Does the new proposal address real estate in low density areas? Specifically those costing +400.000ā¬? I noticed in the article posted a couple days ago, Madalena mentions this carve-out may still exist going forward but the consensus Iāve seen since appears to say All real estate will be ended. This part confuses me.
Is there a lot to be positive about when referring to SEF and how it runs the GV program? Letās ask the people who applied in 2021 and still havenāt received pre-approval (or biometrics invitations, or residency cards.)
Regardless of the legal issues, of which @joelvogel is clearly a much better critic than me, I think SEF and the GV program have earned as much criticism as they can receive. As have all of the private sector people and companies involved with funneling people into it with overly optimistic marketing and assurances. And newcomers deserve to know about the issues before taking the plunge.
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Ohbee, if you would read the opinion you would see there is always the ability to restrict rights given/granted in any Article of the Constitution as long as those restrictions are specifically called out in the constitution as being allowed, such a prison, etc. In the case of retroactivity of the ARI scheme the only restriction at this point is the barring of Russian and Belorussians from application and renewal per the EU because of the war in Ukraine and the EU sanctions.
We will never be in agreement because I try very hard to NOT talk in generalities and present factual information that is gleamed from reading and educating myself. I always want to share information that will inform the community not sway them one way or another.
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Garrett,
Chris @cj807 posted the link to the web-site on which the new proposed revisions are posted. Neither Chris, nor I can monitor it full-time nor do the analysis of what the new proposed edit mean in relation to previous proposed edits and the text of the draft law because it is their full-time job to churn edits to draft laws like this, unfortunately not ours.
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