Citizenship of a foreign country and purchase of real estate there: ten most important questions to answer

In what country should you acquire legal residency? What national state will grant you citizenship without too much trouble? Probably, the best option would be to acquire a residence permit in one of the countries and offer legal residence or citizenship to those foreign nationals who buy real property there. You can purchase foreign property in 2020 in a number of countries to legalize your presence there. But before you do that, there are ten key issues that you need to look at.

The decision to buy foreign property is usually conditioned by the desire to diversify assets. When you buy a house or an apartment abroad, you relocate part of your assets to a different country and normally convert part of your money into a different currency.

You may also be thinking of retiring to a warmer country with a lower cost of living. A great number of US citizens, for example love to spend their golden years in Panama.

Or you may be looking to relocate to a jurisdiction where the tax conditions are more favorable than those in your home country. Malta, for instance, practices the so-called territorial taxation approach when Malta residents’ worldwide income is NOT taxable in Malta.

You may simply feel uncomfortable where you are living at the moment and want to change the scenery.

Thus, there can be many various reasons why people are looking to purchase property in a foreign country. Whatever is your personal reason, you cannot approach this matter in a hasty or relaxed manner.

You have to use your brains to the full and think hard about what exactly you want to have, what exactly your purposes are, and how exactly you would like to see your future in a new country. Of course, it would be sensible to visit the prospective country of residence as a tourist prior to moving there for good.

Besides, you should not keep the possibility of renting residential accommodations in a foreign country out of sight. Make the necessary calculations and decide what is going to work out better for you: buying an apartment or renting it.

However, if you have already made up your mind to purchase foreign property thus acquiring the right to lawfully reside in the country, we suggest that you ask yourself the questions that are found below.

• How much space are you going to need? Would you like to buy a house or an apartment? Should there be one bedroom or more? Two levels or just one? Are your relatives going to visit you often? Are you going to need a guest room or a guesthouse maybe? These are important questions.

• Let us assume that you are planning to buy a detached house. Would you like it to have a front yard and/ or a backyard? What about a swimming pool? These items need to be taken care of. The good thing here is that in many places (in the Caribbean basin countries, for example) you can hire a maintenance company that will keep your property neat and tidy. Caribbean states do offer citizenship by investment into real estate.

• Would you like to live in the city or in the countryside? Most retirees are looking to reside in quiet villages but some will certainly opt for a modern megalopolis like Panama City, for example.

• Would you like your residential accommodations to be turnkey ready or would you like to make the new house fit your taste? Please bear in mind that some countries such as Portugal, for instance, give preferences to foreigners who buy tattered property in the country with the intention to restore it.

• Would you like to live in a gated community where many expats from you country also reside? Or would you like to try and integrate with the local community? Both of these goals are quite possible to achieve. Moreover, you can even find an abode on small tropical island if you immigrate to Grenada, for example.

• What transportation vehicles will be required in your new country of residence? In some places, everything is within walking distance. In others, a bicycle would come in handy. In still others like Vanuatu, for instance, you will be well advised to have a car.

• Are you going to live close enough to the utilities that you need? Is there a supermarket nearby? A school that your children can attend? Pubs, restaurants, nightclubs? There may not be too many things that you want to have in close proximity but if you have to walk two or three miles to the nearest food store, life may well look quite gloomy to you.

• Would you like to buy a furnished house/ apartment or an unfurnished one? Please also decide what bulky things you want to bring with you to your new place of residence. You can do whatever you want: bring all your Louis XIII furniture over or move with one suitcase in your hands. The cost of the former option needs to be taken into account, however.

• What is your budget? This is one of the most important question, probably. Your choice of possible residence options will depend upon the answer to this question to a large degree.

• Finally, what view would you like to find when you look out of your bedroom window every morning? Many people dream of living at the seaside but this option has some drawbacks that need to be taken into consideration too. Apart from the generally higher cost of seaside accommodations, there is also the wind that blows from the sea, the high humidity, and the bigger chance of rain. So, even if you can afford living by the sea, it may still appear not the best option for you personally.

Whichever variant you choose, we will be happy to help you purchase a piece of real estate in a foreign country that will make you qualified for legal residence and citizenship of this country. Currently, more than a dozen countries in the world offer attractive citizenship-by-investment programs and we maintain close ties with the immigration agents working in each and every of them.

Acquiring a second passport in exchange for an investment into real estate looks like a very nice opportunity from whichever angle you view it. The price of the second citizenship varies between one hundred thousand and two and a half million dollars. Regardless of how much money you are prepared to spend within these limits, we will be happy to assist you in obtaining foreign property and a second passport. Please apply for our services by writing to [email protected]. If you would like to ask us any questions related to the matter discussed above, you are most welcome to use the same contact address.