No she couldnt. I think she is not well connected. I m out of this program. Selling and exiting.
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Seems now our fears were confirmed, that the timing of the wave of appointments was indeed disingenuous, to try to fleece as many people as possible of their money before they realised the rug pull was happening.
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Yes, this is the feeling of many… one last hurrah to scalp gullible foreign investors of fees before finalizing the rug pull or the breaking of their promise.
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Didn’t the minister almost admit this in his testimony where he bragged that ARI applicants had been delayed, but now they were going to cash in with all the new biometrics? Which, of course, applicants now pay for up front and then wait ?? months/years to get their card, unlike the old way where they approved you before you paid. It’s almost absurd levels of scam, and yet the applications roll in, so why change?
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Do we know if this was ever verified?
I spent quite a lot of money and time traveling to Porto for my biometrics appointment on March 31. Unfortunately there was a nationwide computer system failure for AIMA and no one was able to be processed (on the following day as well and may actually persist for all I knoe). We were all sent home (in my case back to the US) and are waiting for AIMA to contact us with a future appointment time and date. No one kept us updated while waiting , nor did anyone explain what happened. So it goes…
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Has anyone else gone for biometrics recently? I have my appointment next week and am debating if I should continue with my journey. Would hate to waste another 3k Euros on this foolhardy endeavour and it’s very difficult to believe a word of what my lawyer says.
It depends on your goals. Is the residence permit alone useful to you? If you pay, you will almost certainly get it at some point, though maybe a few years from now. If citizenship is the only goal, it’s a much harder pill to swallow. I would say the chance you have citizenship within 15 years from now is less than 50%.
I applied in Mar 2023, and it’s a closed end fund so will have to take a sizable loss to withdraw early but maybe worth it. I don’t mind waiting but if I get my residency card after another 1-2 years I’m afraid I won’t be interested in it anymore. So was enquiring about whether people are still getting biometric appointments since the last post said they’ve had system failure. Might be time to pullout.
I would pull out if i were you. I am stuck with a “lock-in” with a real estate hotel fund. I cannot seem to pull out until the 6 years is over. I am in similar boat as yours applied in Dec 2022. Feeling utterly betrayed to be honest.
I understand that desire to say FU to Portugal and be done with this mess. I’m tempted too but I’m doing my best to treat this as a purely financial decision without emotion.
I think my closed ended investments are still strong investments. I believe they can meet their expected return and they diversify my money away from dollars and US securities. That gives me peace of mind that my entire financial future isn’t dependent on a madman.
If you’ve been in the PE investments for a couple of years this might be the worst time to pull out. Are they kind of PE investments that buy a bunch in the early years and then sell it in the later years? The ones I investigated expected to start paying dividend income in year 3 or 4. You’ve been forgoing 15% returns on your money for a couple of years. Don’t exit just as it becomes profitable. That’s two bad decisions instead of one.
Your circumstance might be different but, whatever it is, future you will be happy that your decision was based on the math.
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Actually the fund I’ve invested in has a water flow structure and since I’m senior tranche I only get 10% profit plus 3.25% yearly dividend if all goes well.
There really seems like very limited upside but is also downside protected, I thought it made sense while I was getting the passport but now it seems like wishful thinking and lost opportunities. My stock portfolio has performed significantly well over 15% annualized since I invested in Portugal 3 years ago.
Yeah I see. You might be better off pulling out. Big opportunity cost with that GV investment if you think you can continue earning 15% on your own.
I understand why you wanted to limit risk. My advisor told me that most GV investors wanted wealth preservation over upside. I chose upside but maybe I’ll be the one with regrets.
As of this moment, Optimize would have been the best choice. It’s kept up with SP500 growth and is liquid. I’d feel really smart if I’d predicted that. As a well-off American citizen I didn’t appreciate how risk-free my life has been and I can’t continue to expect that.
Don’t think I’ll continue making 15% but also I expect to outperform the paltry 3.6% return. I’m so frustrated and disappointed that it has come to this. I feel like an idiot.
I know how you feel. I was angry at myself for months after the first time this nationality law went through. My therapist helped me walk through why I made the decisions I did with what I knew at the time. My choices were well thought out, but not everything works out. That allowed me to forgive myself.
And it helped that I pivoted to France. It took me a couple of hours to put together the paperwork and they approved my visa within a week. Ironically, one reason I chose Portugal over France originally is that I was worried about the French right wing party changing the rules. I expected that Portugal would be locked-in once I applied. I never considered they would retroactively change the deal.
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Where in France are you going? We have not decided to abandon Portugal (yet) but are looking at options. Anyone know the minimum required time in-country to maintain TLS-Long Sejour?
Cascais today, April 9 — biometrics complete. Sharing since this thread has been silent for nearly 2 weeks.
Context: applied Dec 2022, Mercan hotel investment.
Timeline:
- Arrived 15 min early for my 10:30 AM appointment
- I was told AIMA only opened at 9:30 (not on time), so all appointments running late
- I was sequence #12, lawyer was processing #5 when I arrived
- Process complete by 11:45 — total ~1h 30min from arrival
Process itself:
- Met the Mercan host on arrival, she introduced me to the lawyer
- Lawyer handled all the talking
- Handed over: latest tax certificate (apostilled), criminal record (apostilled), passport along with the boarding pass
- Then: 1 photo, 2 index fingerprints, card payment
- Done
Card payment:
- Used my Mastercard credit card from India — worked first try, no issues
- Had 3 backup cards in my wallet just in case (UAE Visa debit, UAE Mastercard credit, etc.) plus Apple Pay
- Important: rejected the currency conversion prompt
Notes from chatting with people there:
- Met another GV investor from South Africa — same story, same betrayal
- Mercan rep openly acknowledged the law change is a betrayal and said she feels helpless about it
- Mercan’s estimate for card issuance: 9-12 months
- Mercan thinks the bulk of the biometric backlog will clear by June, so dependents could potentially be called from July onward (their words — take with a grain of salt)
Side observation:
- Saw a Bangladeshi paperless immigrant at the same time applying for his D1 visa appointment — was handed a document postponing his appointment by 3 months. So delays/postponements are still happening for other categories.
My decision going forward:
- Not pursuing biometrics for my wife and daughter (~13k in additional fees on top of all this)
- Plan is to trigger the Mercan buyback in 2028 and exit
- Don’t need a Golden Visa to visit Portugal as a tourist
Good luck to everyone still in the queue.
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I dragged this thread way off topic. I’ve started a new thread about alternatives to Portugal.
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Quick update for my (December 2022 applicant) biometrics appointment in Cascais today, April 10th. Others have already covered the nature of the office and surroundings, so I’ll leave my timeline.
10:45 - Met my lawyer, handed over apostilled criminal record and Tax ID copy from the 2025 resubmission, boarding pass for entry into Portugal, and passport.
11:00 - Scheduled appointment time
Lawyer takes care of all the paperwork and payment
12:24 - Entered the office for biometrics and signatures
12:27 - Left the office
12:39 - Lawyer meets me outside to handover passport, all done
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Lucky you. I had an appointment on 8th April, but unfortunately there are still no flights from the Middle East region, due to the ongoing conflict and the airspace closure. I truly hope and pray that we can get the appointment rescheduled soon based on our force majeure circumstances.
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