Buying a house and applying for permanent residence
Some people asks if it is possible to apply for permanent residence if you buy a house in Spain.
The official name of permanent residence in Spain is “larga duración“, which means that you can stay and work in Spain for a long time. The advantages of permanent residence are also very important in comparison to other types of residence. For example, the time limit for entry and exit is more relaxed.
Can I buy a house in Spain and apply for permanent residence?
Many people thinks that you can buy a house in Spain and get permanent residence directly, but that is not true. Article 32 of the Spanish Law on Foreigners clearly states that the application for permanent residence requires 5 years of legal and continuous residence in Spain. If you have not lived in Spain for 5 years, you will not be able to apply for permanent residence.
Note: If you are a descendant of Spanish nationals, have had Spanish citizenship or have family reunification residency in special cases, you can apply for permanent residence without having lived in Spain for 5 years.
Continuity is defined as a single absence of no more than 6 months in the last 5 years and a cumulative absence of no more than 10 months over 5 years. If this period of time is exceeded, then it is not possible to apply for permanent residence.
Can you apply for permanent residence directly by buying 500,000 euros of property?
No, you can’t either. Previously, Spain published an article ” 2019 investment immigration pathway to Spain explained ” to explain the two common ways to immigrate to Spain. You should know that the residence obtained through 500,000 investment immigrants, officially called “investor residence” (residencia de inversores in Spanish), is a kind of temporary residence, not permanent residence. The other type of residence is the non-profit residence, which is also not a direct application for permanent residence, and currently, most of the immigration agents handle non-profit residence. The non-profit residency does not require any investment in property, and the applicant can apply for a non-profit residency visa (also known as a non-working residency visa) from the Spanish embassy abroad as long as he or she proves to have certain financial means.
If you want to apply for permanent residence, after obtaining the investment residence, you still need to live in Spain continuously for 5 years and leave the country for no more than 10 months cumulatively and no more than 6 months in a single visit within 5 years.
