WIKI: HOW-TO: Golden Visa Renewal Mega Thread (January 2025 →)

[PTbound (A L)]

There’s an entire thread for that very topic:

7 day stay in initial year or 14 days stay in the first 2 years?

I would ask yourself this - how much risk are you willing to accept? If a law says there is a requirement of 7 days required within the 1st year, simply because AIMA has chosen not to enforce that requirement doesn’t mean they can, will or will be allowed to continue to do the same. So, if the government continues down its anti-immigration path, scrutinizes visa compliance and decides to use that as a reason to deny your renewal or citizenship application down the road - how will that impact y…

Plus an intense debate on the same topic here:

New online ARI renewal process (Feb 2026)

I think this is the most coherent point - there are clearly differing interpretations of the law so it’s important to consider potential failure modes and how they might be impact things. If you interpret the law to mean you don’t need to spend time in country while cards are pending and are wrong then you’ve either set your timeline back by however long or you’ve signed yourself up for potentially expensive litigation, which you may not win. If you interpret the law to mean you do need to sp…