Spain abolishes ‘golden visas’ to curb property speculation

More than ten years after its introduction, this measure has caused too many side effects. Spain will stop issuing “golden visas” given to foreign nationals investing in property to curb speculation affecting many of the country’s cities, Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez said on Monday.

The government will cancel the provision golden visas allowing you to obtain a residence permit for investments in real estate of more than half a million euros,” said the Socialist leader during a trip near Seville (south).

The removal, which will be approved by the Council of Ministers on Tuesday, will combat “speculative investments” that are affecting “many young people and families” who today cannot access housing, he continued. Golden visas allow non-EU citizens to obtain a three-year residence and work permit provided they invest at least €500,000 in a Spanish business or property.

They were introduced in 2013 by the conservative government of Mariano Rajoy, which wanted to revive investment in the country in the midst of an economic downturn caused by the financial and real estate crisis.

“Unacceptable”

“Today, 94 out of 100 golden visas are related to real estate investments,” rather than business investments, Pedro Sanchez detailed on Monday. They are also concentrated in “large cities such as Barcelona, ​​Madrid, Malaga, Alicante, the Balearic Islands and the city of Valencia” where “the housing market is very tight”, he added.

Several southern European countries that used similar programs to attract investment during the financial crisis have in recent months decided to tighten the screws in the face of this highly controversial exceptional regime. Thus, Portugal stopped issuing golden visas at the beginning of 2023 amid a sharp rise in housing prices. At the end of March, Greece tightened the rules for issuing exceptional residence permits.

“Golden visas are a disgrace for Europe. It is unacceptable that a person is granted a residence permit just because he is a multimillionaire,” Ernest Urtasun, a spokesman for the far-left Sumar party, the Socialists’ partner in government and culture minister, insisted on Monday. In 2019, Brussels was concerned that the practice benefited wealthy Chinese and Russians in particular, believing it posed risks to the EU “in particular with regard to security, money laundering and tax evasion.”