Real estate continues to dominate the granting of “visa gold” to foreign nationals in Portugal. From November 2015 to February 2016 applicants for residence permits invested €210m in real estate. Those who want to qualify for visas through investment must buy properties worth more than €500,000. In four months, 376 residence permits were issued under the program. Besides making real estate investments, candidates can also invest in job-creating ventures or transfer capital. Between November and February, €23.5m was invested by the job-creators, while the last category of visa application forms were accompanied by €233.5m in capital transfers.
Most of the applicants come from Brazil, Angola, China, Jordan, Libya, Russia, South Africa and Saudi Arabia. The Residence Authorization for Investment Activity was introduced five years. From 2012 until the end of December 2015 a total of 2,788 residence permits have been issued under the program.
