Valencia Property Blog

Honestly, we cannot believe the lack of knowledge of people contacting us from the UK expecting to be able to move to Spain to live and sometimes work in 2021 just as they have previously done. The fact is a lot of people don't realise that their government has conned them. Spanish Residency Post Brexit is not that easy.

It's not quite as simple as just moving over here unfortunately. The UK will be a third country in the eyes of Spain and the rest of the EU and UK citizens will therefore have to satisfy the same requirements to come and live in Spain as other non EU nationalities. In this post we are going to help you negotiate the morass of new regulations for Brits.

First The Good News

You can still move to Spain and more importantly Valencia, voted by expats as their favourite place to live. Yay!!!

Now Brace Yourself, the Bad News

It's not quite as easy as it was, in fact it's a lot more difficult. But in this post we are going to guide you through the process.

The Basics

You will need to show that you can support yourself, that you won't be a burden on the State and that any family members are supported too. You do this by applying for a non-lucrative visa.

How do you do that? You need to apply for residency, initially for one year and very probably you will do it just like any other nationality, in other words you will need:

A valid passport with at least one year left on it.
Proof of residency status in the UK (This is a maybe)
You should have a minimum income for getting the Spanish non lucrative visa of of over 2151 Euros per month plus an extra 538 Euros per dependent per month if applying as a family. This income must be there WITHOUT having to engage in economic activity in Spain. Usually you will need to open a bank account in Spain and deposit a year's worth of money to prove this. (Opening the bank account may prove difficult if your source of income is non traditional eg self employed or freelance. Expect to be asked by the bank for tax information from the last couple of years)
Have a private health insurance policy without any copayment. (As we have mentioned before on these pages this becomes more expensive as you get older)
Fill in the Non-Lucrative Visa application form, EX-01. (You can find it here)
A completed visa application form. You can download it here.
A completed application form Modelo 790, Código 052, with payment made.
A Medical Certificate from your home country
A police check certificate from any countries that you have lived in for the last five years.
You may be asked for other papers to accompany these above.

The processing time for the application is around three months.

Comparison

Prior to 2021 this is what you had to do.

Turn Up. That's it

Brexit, it's the gift that keeps on giving.

Alternative Visas

The above non-lucrative visa will be the most used one for UK people applying for residency in 2021 and beyond unless there is a mutual agreement between the UK and Spain (Don't hold your breath) However there are alternatives.

The Entrepreneur's Visa

You can get a visa for an initial two years if you are setting up a business in Spain. You can see all of the requirements on this page (And that's a lot of requirements). Basic requirement is to be setting up a business that is in the interests of the Spanish economy, to be potentially creating jobs in Spain and to have a written and costed business plan to carry out the project.

Going down this route is very unlikely as you would probably be better served with the following visa.

The Golden Visa

As a non EU country citizen you can get easy access into Spain and the rest of the Schengen area by investing over 500k in property, or 1-2 million euros in Government bonds or shares. The property part is easy. Once you have invested this money you can apply for the Golden Visa and you will be granted it. You can read more about it here.

The Golden Visa gives you the right to be in Spain 365 days a year but doesn't oblige you to be in Spain at all apart from one visit in the first year and successive years. It is also a pathway to citizenship if in the first five years you spend more than 180 days a year here. With the non lucrative visa you actually have to be here for over 180 days a year to maintain it whereas the Golden Visa doesn't require you to be here.

We have clients who have got the Golden Visa by mortgaging their property in the United States for example and using the funds to buy a property in Spain over 500k without mortgage. This will be possible for UK clients after the 1st of January 2021. As mentioned in the article above, the best thing about Valencia is that you can split the 500k investment over several properties giving you a rental income as well as a place to live!

Our lawyers can guide you through the process of getting all of the above visas and we highly recommend using them as negotiating the minefield of Spanish bureaucracy can be a challenge at times and is definitely massively time consuming. Contact us for their details if you are interested in property and the Golden Visa.

The Cost Of Living in Valencia

We have written an article about the cost of living in Valencia in 2021 and compared it to other destinations. Take a look by clicking on the image or link.

In Other News...

Valencia Property was featured in The Sunday Times last week. You can see a screenshot the article on our page here sent by one of our clients or alternatively if you have a Sunday Times subscription here. Both of the case studies in the article are our clients so that's good.

Our Whatsapp Business Account

We have moved our Whatsapp account over to a business account. This allows us to add a catalogue into our offers there too. If you want to be included in our broadcast list where we send first notifications of price drops, new properties, bargains, blog posts and more drop me a line on whatsapp with your name and the message "I want in" and I'll add you. Strictly limited to the first 256 people to contact as that's the limit Whatsapp allows us and filling up fast!