I noticed that the Portugal Golden Visa program allows for investment in real estate, capital investment or job creation. I am open to any of the three options. Is one of these options considered less risky? Will one of these options result in faster processing times?
There is no specific method that allows the application to be faster. However, from my experience, when the applicant chooses the capital investment, the process is less bureaucratic, which can make the process faster. The job creation is the option less chosen and the one that takes longer.
Currently (since 2012 to June 2018), there were 6,159 residency permits for pursuing investment activities that were granted Golden Visa cards. From that total, 5,668 were based on a standard real estate investment (500,000 euros), 148 based in real estate investment with rehabilitation works (350,000 euros), 332 based in financial investment (1 million euros) and 11 by creating at least 10 jobs. As such, despite there being eight options for investment, it is clear that foreign investors prefer to invest in real estate. In fact, Portugal was considered to be the one of the best destinations for real estate investment in 2017 and 2018. Notwithstanding, for investors who prefer the simplest and fastest process, the recommendation would be the deposit in a Portuguese bank because the investment process is faster, as is the analysis at the immigration office and approval and renewal of the residence card. On the other hand, in terms of risk, the analysis of a better option of investment would depend on the investor’s risk profile. The safest one, according to our opinion, is the real estate investment option, because in Portugal there is no limit regarding the ownership right. Property ownership is protected by the Portuguese constitution as a fundamental right. Moreover, for real estate located in a city center, liquidity is almost always assured at any time.
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