Makes sense. It is currently hard to estimate. Will put 9-12 month
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More like 12 - 24 months these days 
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I am considering to switch from GV to D7.
May I ask any of you with D7 experience some questions:
- As I understood, D7 application is considered at the Embassy of the Original country. When we renew the D7 visa, shall we have to return to the Embassy in our country ? or we can simple renew it in Portugal ? The application to renew the D7 will consist all elements as we do for the first one. Basically, the Embassy will need us to prove again our financial status. Please correct meā¦
- The duration of D7 visa is 1 year for new applicants ? then is it 2 years after its renewal ?
Many thanks in advance
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Thank you very much !!!
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Hi! We are in an identical situation to you, and a few months down the line, I am curious as to whether you managed to change your GVās to D7ās? Crucially, did you manage to apply for your D7ās from within Portugal, or did you have to go back to your home country? We are from Uganda, so we donāt actually have a Portuguese embassy in our country to apply throughā¦Thanks in advance.
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Hi Paddy,
I have not yet tried to change to the D7, my lawyer suggested waiting until March 2023 to apply for Permanent Residency since that will mark 5 years since I got my first card. However, I did speak with her about the possibility of changing to the D7 and she told me that there is a way to change to a āD7 typeā visa without leaving the country. She said that it is not called a D7 and she did not tell me what it is called.
But for now, I am just sitting tight and will hopefully get an appointment for permanent residence in March. Also, she said that itās not only GV renewal appointments that are delayed, she says there is a delay with any kind of appointment that is made inside Portugal. So even switching could take some time unless you apply for the D7 from outside the country.
I can pass her contact details on to you if you would like to speak to her.
Do you need to travel urgently? My GV expired in April 2021 and I have managed to get by in Portugal by showing the QR code from ARI portal and the decree law explaining that my visa is ātechnicallyā valid.
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Hi Moira,
As i understood correctly, your GV is expired since April 2021. So by March 2023 you will apply the PR under the current expired card 
. Is this possible to do so ? Will you need a letter from SEF certtifying that you have lived in PT 5 years from the date on your first card ? And if you could apply PR, will you also apply for citizenship at the same time ?
I am also curious about the way to switch to D7, but as you mentioned your lawyer said there was a way but it is not called D7. I will investigate it myself first. If I could not find the solution, i might need the contact of your lawyer. I hope itās Ok. Thanks in advance
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Thanks Moiraā¦The immigration complications we are facing extend far beyondāthe borders of Portugalā¦hence the urgency.
Your account is helpful, thank you. Our own lawyer has finally deigned to respond, so i will ask them about this other type of visa.
Good luck and chat soon in the forum!
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Hi Moira, Iām also trying to change from the GV to the D7, or rather to āpassive income visaā. My final GV renewal is coming up soon, but I was told that the only time that counts toward permanent residency is when your card is actually valid. Can you send me the name of your attorney? Iād love to get a different perspective on this. Obrigada!
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Hi Jae,
Wishing you all best of luck on the switching process and please update your steps here if possible. My card will end in late 2024 but I am doing my due diligence and investigating the possibility of this switching. So your update will help me tremendously.
Many thanks in advance.
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Hi live2learn!
Yes my card expired in April 2021, in theory it is possible to do so because technically my card is valid - since the issuance of the Decree Law (Decreto-Lei n.o 23-A/2022 de 18 de fevereiro) which extended the validity of all expired visas until 31 December 2022.
So if they extend the law (as they have been doing every time we reach the expiry date) then my visa will have technically been valid for 5 years.
So technically SEF will supply me with the letter stating that I have had ālegal residenceā for 5 years.
Yes I also intend to apply for citizenship at the same time but I will need the PR as well because apparently citizenship applications can take up to 2 years to be processed.
Since I only moved here in 2020, I am relying on the first 2.5 years of GV minimum stay requirements (also known as legal residence) to count towards my permanent residence AND citizenship applications. If for some reason, I am unsuccessful in March - I will be switching to the passive income visa because I do not want to pay the high GV renewal fees (considering I did not have any of the benefits of the GV for the last 2 years) or the ā¬7000 GV permanent residence fee.
So letās see what happens in March!!!
Iāll ask my lawyer again for the name of the passive income visa that one can apply for from inside the country, if she tells me - I will let you all know! Or I am more than happy to pass on her details.
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Hi Moira!
You kind response is greatly appreciated. You are a pioneer for many people like me.
I will be keeping my eyes on this thread.
I am not sure if you are aware of the ānormal PRā which has a very low fee (maybe just 300-500Euro) with the requirement of stay 183 days /year in the country. It is a better option than the GV PR.
Wishing you all the best!
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Hello all. I hope this is the right thread. I think weāre going to pull our funds out of our GV investment fund (ours donāt have a penalty for that), and then weāll switch to one of the D visas. We applied at the end of Dec. 2021, but since weāve decided we want to reside in Portugal, we think a D visa will be a better fit. Our attorneys said we do have to abandon the GV application to switch to a D visa. Hopefully everything will come together so we can move there next summer!
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Christine, weāre doing the exact same thing, except that our attorney said we could still keep the GV process going while applying for the D7. As usual, inconsistencies and confusion abound 
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Hello! How has this worked out for you? Considering the same.
Hi We are doing the same (except we canāt pull our funds out!!)āhave you applied for the D7 yet? any issues?
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Hi, We are doing the same and also dealing with inconsistencies and difficultiesāhave you applied for the D7 yet? any issues?
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So you have successfully applied for the d7 without affecting your GV application?
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Did they say you have to end the GV process when applying for the d7?
Hi all. With the pending demise of the ARI program, this topic has become more relevant than ever, especially for people who already have ARI permits and need to renew at some point.
This article states that all existing ARI permits will be converted a startup visa type. The requirements for this type are totally different than ARI; thereās zero overlap.
So for those who already have ARI permits and already live in Portugal, switching to D7 seems like pretty much the only choice. But of course that means somehow applying from within Portugal, which might or might not be possible.
Can anyone whoās started or completed the process let us know how it went?
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