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    How Much Will It Cost You To Live Overseas?

    The only honest answer is, we have no idea. And neither does anyone else. The only one who can answer that question is you. Here’s the most important thing to understand about budgeting your new life overseas…

    Super Cheap

    • Chitré, Panama
    • Santa Marta, Colombia
    • Phuket, Thailand
    • Dumaguete, The Philippines

    Cheap

    • Medellin, Colombia
    • Boquete, Panama
    • Kyrenia, Cyprus
    • Hua Hin, Thailand
    • The Algarve, Portugal

    Affordable

    • Valencia, Spain
    • Cascais, Portugal
    • Las Terrenas, The DR
    • Pisa, Italy
    • La Rochelle, France
    • Mazatlán, Mexico

    Luxury

    • Ambergris Caye, Belize
    • Kotor, Montenegro
    • The Panama City Beaches
    • Paris, France
  • Resources

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  • Home
  • Countries

    Top Destinations:

    Whether you’re looking for fun and sun, a peaceful retirement, or the chance to earn some extra income, you’ve got a real world of opportunity open to you… In short, we’ve done our best to narrow down your best options, but only you can decide the right country for you.

    • Spain
    • Portugal
    • Panama
    • Belize
    • Colombia
    • Cyprus
    • Mexico
    • France
    • Montenegro
    • Browse All Countries

    Best For:

    • The Best Places To Retire
    • Health Care Abroad
    • Cost Of Living
    • Investing in Real Estate
    • Establishing Residency
    • Gun Laws In The World
    • English-Speaking Countries
    • Safest Places For Retirement
    • Best Places In Latin America
  • Budgets

    How Much Will It Cost You To Live Overseas?

    The only honest answer is, we have no idea. And neither does anyone else. The only one who can answer that question is you. Here’s the most important thing to understand about budgeting your new life overseas…

    Super Cheap

    • Chitré, Panama
    • Santa Marta, Colombia
    • Phuket, Thailand
    • Dumaguete, The Philippines

    Cheap

    • Medellin, Colombia
    • Boquete, Panama
    • Kyrenia, Cyprus
    • Hua Hin, Thailand
    • The Algarve, Portugal

    Affordable

    • Valencia, Spain
    • Cascais, Portugal
    • Las Terrenas, The DR
    • Pisa, Italy
    • La Rochelle, France
    • Mazatlán, Mexico

    Luxury

    • Ambergris Caye, Belize
    • Kotor, Montenegro
    • The Panama City Beaches
    • Paris, France
  • Resources

    Global Living

    • Living & Retiring Overseas
    • Raising A Family Abroad
    • Foreign Residency & Citizenship
    • Offshore & Diversification

    Making Money

    • International Real Estate
    • Banking
    • Employment
    • Investing

    Follow Us:

    • Meet Our Experts
  • Real Estate

    Buying Real Estate For Cashflow

    • Discover tips and strategies used by global property investing veterans

    Explore Our Latest Posts

    • Learn how to invest and purchase property abroad…

    Go To The Overseas Property Alert Site

    • How To Become Independently Wealthy And Fund The Lifestyle Of Your Dreams
  • Conferences

    Upcoming Events

    • Explore Our Events Site

    Live and Invest In Spain Conference

    Offshore Wealth Summit

    Greece Workshop

    VALENCIA, SPAIN

    Sep. 17-19, 2025

    PANAMA CITY, PANAMA

    Oct. 15-17, 2025

    VIRTUAL

    Nov. 13, 2025

    Learn More About This Event
    Learn More About This Event
    PRE-REGISTER
    Learn More About This Event
    PRE-REGISTER
    • MORE EVENTS

    Contact Our Events Team

    Toll-Free U.S. and Canada:
    1 (888) 627 8834
    From Outside North America:
    1 (443) 599 1221
    Working Hours
    Monday – Friday 08:00 am – 17:00 pm EST.

    Reach us with your questions by email at: events@liveandinvestoverseas.com

  • Store

    Unlock The World

    • Access Your Library

    Overseas Havens Reports

    • Expats' comprehensive destination guides

    Conference Kits

    • Hours of coverage  from our latests conferences

    Lahardan Books

    • Titles on living and investing around the world
    • Explore Our Store
    Your passport to a life well-lived abroad

    Services

    overseas living letter offers affordable retirement guidance
    The Simon Letter Wealth Protection Insights
    Global Property Advisor Global Investment Opportunities

    Our Customer Service team is here to assist with any questions or concerns CustomerService@LiveandInvestOverseas.com

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Home Residency/Citizenship

Why You Shouldn’t Get A Golden Visa

by Kathleen Peddicord
May 02, 2024
in Residency/Citizenship
0 0
Greek islands Symi, Dodecanese

AdobeStock/Freesurf

The tide is turning among Europe’s golden visa programs.

A wave of more restrictive policies, more expensive minimum thresholds, and outright eliminations of programs has swept across the Continent in recent months.

Ireland eliminated its Immigrant Investor Program in 2023.

Portugal made the real estate investment option of its golden visa program—previously Europe’s most popular—more restrictive and expensive before eventually abolishing it (also last year).

Greece is one of the latest countries to follow suit. After weeks of vague statements and speculation about changes to its highly coveted golden visa program, the Ministry of Finance confirmed the new policies on March 21.

The main takeaway is that the minimum thresholds for real estate investment have gone up. Specifically, they have increased from 500,000 to 800,000 euros for homes in Greece’s most popular and populated zones and from 250,000 to 400,000 euros everywhere else.

A handful of lower-cost real estate investment options remains available. If you buy a property that has been converted from commercial to residential or buy and restore a listed building, the minimum threshold remains at 250,000 euros.

These changes took effect on March 31, but the government is providing a transition period that lasts until September 30. If you pay a 10% deposit on property in Greece before September 30, you can qualify for a golden visa under the current, less-expensive thresholds.

Does this mean that you should rush over to Greece and put down a deposit on a home in the next six months if you’re interested in living there?

Not in my opinion.

A Greek golden visa investment only makes sense in a handful of specific cases (if you’re from a country that does not enjoy visa-free travel to the EU or if you’re looking to gain residency without becoming a tax resident in Greece).

If you’re just interested in property investment in Greece, you don’t need to use its golden visa program. You can buy the property that best suits your objectives or has the most investment potential, free of the location and price restrictions that the golden visa program imposes.

If you’re interested in gaining residency in Greece, there are simpler, more affordable alternatives, such as the Financially Independent Persons Visa (a “self-sufficiency” visa) and the digital nomad visa.

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What if you’re interested in gaining citizenship in Greece?

I recently replied to a reader who was seeking a Greek golden visa to gain the ability to live in any Schengen country.

She believed that the golden visa program would grant her this ability. She was mistaken, however, because a Greek golden visa would only grant her EU residency.

The right to free movement in the Schengen Area is reserved for EU citizens. It’s a massive benefit, enabling EU citizens to travel, work, and live in any other EU country without administrative formalities.

EU citizenship amplifies the number of options you have available to you, and options are among the world’s most valuable commodities.

The best way to get EU citizenship through Greece, assuming you’re not born or marrying into Greek citizenship, is by putting in the time as a legal resident.

Greece, like many European countries, grants citizenship through naturalization to those who have lived there with legal residency for a certain number of years.

The number of years varies from country to country. In Greece’s case, it’s seven years.

It does not matter if you’ve gained residency through a golden visa program or one of the simpler, more affordable residency alternatives I mentioned.

Despite the hype surrounding Greece’s golden visa program, it does not offer much benefit when it comes to gaining citizenship specifically.

As part of your citizenship application, you’ll have to pass a Greek language test and have been a tax resident in the country during those seven years.

This nullifies one of the main benefits that the Greek golden visa touts: that it doesn’t impose a physical presence requirement (and therefore tax residency). In other words, as long as you invest in a golden visa, you can maintain Greek residency status without ever even visiting the country.

But if you want to use that golden visa to eventually qualify for citizenship, you’ll need to spend 183 days per year in the country anyway, just as you would if you’d applied for residency using the Financially Independent Persons Visa.

Keep in mind that the financial threshold you need to meet to qualify for the latter is 2,000 euros per month (versus a minimum of 250,000 euros for a Greek golden visa).

Despite the fact that I think the program only makes sense in a small number of cases, the changes highlight an important point that I make often: you should act quickly if you’re interested in a particular opportunity overseas.

Things like golden visas, citizenship by investment, and tax programs are subject to rapid change in today’s world.

Until next time,

Kathleen Peddicord signature

Kathleen Peddicord

Founding Publisher, Overseas Opportunity LetterEditor´s Note: This article was first featured in Forbes. 

Tags: 'Taxes For The American Abroad'apply for citizenshipbackup residency Portugalgolden visa programsGreece
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Kathleen Peddicord

Kathleen Peddicord

Kathleen Peddicord has reported on opportunities for Americans to live, retire, and do business overseas for 40 years. She has traveled to more than 75 countries, invested in real estate in 24, established businesses in 7, renovated and built properties in 6, and educated her children in 5.

Kathleen has moved children, staff, enterprises, household goods, and pets from the east coast of the United States to Waterford, Ireland, then to Paris, France, and finally to Panama City, Panama, where she has based her Live And Invest Overseas business. Peddicord and her husband, Lief Simon, now divide their time between Panama and Paris.

Peddicord was a partner with Agora Publishing’s International Living group for 23 years. She opened, staffed, and operated International Living publishing and real estate marketing offices in Waterford, Ireland; Panama City, Panama; Granada, Nicaragua; Roatan, Honduras; San Miguel de Allende, Mexico; Quito, Ecuador; and Paris, France. Peddicord launched Live And Invest Overseas group in 2008 and has built it into a successful multimillion-dollar business. Today, she shares her firsthand experience of expat life with more than 500,000 readers of her publications, including Overseas Opportunity Letter and Overseas Living Letter.

Kathleen has been featured often in The New York Times, MSNBC, AARP, CNN, Bloomberg, CNBC, and more and writes monthly about expat matters, international real estate, and offshore diversification for Forbes and U.S. News.

Kathleen has written several books including the memoirs “At Home In Ireland” and “At Home At Los Islotes” and her latest title “At Home Abroad,” all published by Lahardan Books. Her best-selling "How To Retire Overseas: Everything You Need To Know To Live Well (For Less) Abroad” was published by Penguin Random House in 2018 and her “Buying Real Estate Overseas For Cash Flow (And A Better Life)” was published by Wiley in August 2020.

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Top Countries

  • Spain
  • Portugal
  • Panama
  • Belize
  • Colombia
  • Cyprus
  • Mexico
  • France
  • Montenegro

Best For:

  • Health Care Abroad
  • Retirement Living
  • Cost Of Living
  • Investing in Real Estate
  • Establishing Residency
  • Gun Ownership
  • English Speakers
  • Safety
BROWSE ALL COUNTRIES

Budgets

How Much Will It Cost
To Live Overseas?

Super Cheap

  • Chitré, Panama
  • Santa Marta, Colombia
  • Phuket, Thailand
  • Dumaguete, The Philippines

Cheap

  • Medellin, Colombia
  • Boquete, Panama
  • Kyrenia, Cyprus
  • Hua Hin, Thailand
  • The Algarve, Portugal

Affordable

  • Valencia, Spain
  • Cascais, Portugal
  • Las Terrenas, The DR
  • Pisa, Italy
  • La Rochelle, France
  • Mazatlán, Mexico

Luxury

  • Ambergris Caye, Belize
  • Kotor, Montenegro
  • The Panama City Beaches
  • Paris, France

Resources

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