Thanks Hippopotamouse. My post was a true question and I am grateful for your explanation. It is always educational to get the view of others and I hope there will be more replies
I fall into the international family situation but we are both from developed countries. Pandemics like Covid certainly curtailed travel but most countries also relaxed issues such as taxation that effect us. War is a dreadful thing but I do not see it effecting the countries I use. My countries will not really curtail travel (I have no interest in entering those that might) nor restrict as opposed to monitor capital, and I am happy to comply as I seek to do everything within the laws
So it seems to me that the GV pathway is useful for those wanting to leave or be able to leave their own country as opposed to becoming a nomad.
One more factor is the underlying passport one holds. If that allows free travel without painful visa related restrictions, being a nomad from a tax residence perspective is simpler. Else, one may need to first flip to a better passport and then manage the tax residency as a secondary aspect.
Turkey. If the information given here Turkey Golden Visa: 6 Steps to Citizenship [2023] is correct. Of course this doesn’t give you any Schengen rights but it is probably a better passport than a Caribbean island nation one and although it now costs quite a bit more if I the source given above is correct one could simply park an investment denominated in dollars in a Turkish account for awhile. Or buy an apartment in Istanbul.
On a personal note, as a UK citizen, my PGV application is partly about my interest in Portugal, partly about flexibility in EU residence, but in part because I want my bloody rights back as a citizen of the European Union that were taken away from me with Brexit. There’s a big psychological component to it all, I can’t deny.
Turkey was originally out for me due to its totalitarian leader and proximity to conflict zones (Syria, Iran, etc.), but now I’m seriously considering for the reasons you mentioned.
Unlike the tiny islands, it appears less likely to be leveraged by any one foreign power in the event of a conflict between major powers.
I’m quickly pivoting from Portugal to Spain and welcome any advice! Louis, would you mind sayng where you bought ? I’m booking a scouting trip and starting in Valencia. Did your real estate purchase take long? Can you recommend an immigration lawyer? I’ve requested several quotes but am concerned to find one who will move quickly, before this window closes, too. At least my cash is already in Euros, but in a Portuguese bank.
I bought in the Costa del Sol area, not far from Malaga.
The purchase itself was pretty quick. After sending the deposit, we had the keys a month later. The purchase was done in front of a notary with the previous owners. Prior to that, my lawyer spent a few weeks investigating the property to see if there were any issues or debts. We also had an inspection done by an ‘ingeniero tecnico de obras publicas’ to ensure the house was in good shape.
The process that took the longest was getting the NIE number for my wife in a consulate abroad. The closest consulate was 3 hours away and the bureaucracy was terrible. They didn’t know what a golden visa (visa de inversor) was and said that my wife didn’t need a NIE. After they finally accepted the application, it took 1 month for the email with the NIE document to arrive. So I would get started with obtaining the NIE asap.
I don’t know any lawyers in the Valencia or Costa Blanca area. I used Daemi abogados in Marbella for both the house purchase and GV application. They were excellent.
This article was super interesting! Before I ever heard of the Portugal GV my primary interest had been in obtaining Spanish citizenship. However I really did not want to renounce my other citizenships and was also put off by the requirement for 10 years continued legal residence in Spain.
But according to this article you can obtain Spanish citizenship by residence after “(only) 2 years (of continued legal residence in Spain) for (I presume the article means citizens of) countries with which Spain has a dual citizenship agreement!
!!Furthermore, I see that Portugal is listed as one of the countries with which Spain has a dual citizenship agreement!!
Does this mean that if one manages to get Portuguese citizenship - via the GV with only the minimum stay requirements of a few days per year for 5 years - one can then just hop to Spain and reside there for 2 years and apply for Spanish citizenship via the Portuguese citizenship? 2 years in Spain would be really manageable!
In such a case would Spain still require you to renounce (or even declare) your other non-Portuguese citizenships? Fascinating!
No idea what the public benefits are in either! tbh I don’t have a particularly rational answer to your question. Why two EU citizenships? Well after Brexit - and I have to say that when I first naturalised as a UK citzn, which is a while ago, never in my wildest dreams did I think any country would leave the EU! I thought I had gained not just one citizenship but over 20! Freedom to live, work etc etc! But then Brexit happened and we all lost so much as a result! (Ok no more remoaning!) So now I just feel 2 or more EU citizenships, why not get as many as you can, if you can. It provides just a bit extra insurance in a crazy unstable world. Two years residence in Spain would not be difficult for me so why not?
Plus I was always a fan of Spanish culture - food, music, language, way of life. I am sure I will also get to know Portugal better too as time goes by and will love both countries.
Based on the discussion, I believe the fast-track Spanish citizenship is only available for nationals of Portugal and Ibero-American countries. This likely means that only people born in those countries would be eligible for the fast-track citizenship.
Thanks @louisz I didn’t think in practice there was much difference between a national and a citizen. You could be born in Portugal, to non-Portuguese parents, then leave at a young age and so have no real Portuguese roots/ancestry as such.
But rather than try and second guess this the best thing is probably to just get a decent Spanish immigration lawyer.
Varied populists in some other EU states - France, Italy, Hungary - had been threatening their own versions of Brexit if they came into power. Although they have more recently all gone pretty quiet on this point - maybe cos of the disaster that is Brexit? - I guess nothing is truly for certain, or forever.
I know this may be a long shot for most of you - as I assume most people here are looking for routes to EU citizenship with shorter stay requirements than the usual 6 months per year for 5+ years - however, for what it is worth, if you have or can get UK citizenship, then the Common Travel Area between the UK and Ireland lets you freely live, work, travel etc in Ireland. There is no investment required for this so potentially a more cost effective route by comparison with various GV programmes. So in this case you could live in Ireland for 5 years with a UK citizenship, after which you could qualify for Irish (and hence EU) citizenship.
