Portugal
- Advertised
- €500,000
- Everything else, first year
- €28,000
- Real, first year
- €528,000
- First permit
- 60 days by law, a year or more in practice
- Tax
- IFICI, 20% flat for 10 years
How we check figures
How the comparison is built
Four questions, one method, applied the same way to five jurisdictions. We sell no property and no developer can buy a better place in the table: partners pay us for an introduction, and whether that is a fixed fee or a share of their own fee changes neither what you pay nor who receives your enquiry. The figures come from statutes and official tariffs rather than agency brochures, and they are revised when a rule changes, not on a schedule.
Four questions, not forty
Route, threshold, time to a first permit, tax regime. They are the only four that change a decision; everything else is detail that belongs on the jurisdiction's own page.
Primary sources only
Government texts and official fee schedules, never agency brochures. Every page names its source and the date it was checked.
Re-checked when the rules move
Not on a calendar. Thresholds in this category change several times a year, and a table dated last spring is worse than no table.
You pay us nothing
We do not sell property and take nothing from you. A partner pays for an introduction, by a fixed fee or a share of their own fee, and neither buys a position in this table. Where we name a company, we say that it is our partner.
Five jurisdictions
Portugal, Greece, Malta, the UAE and Cyprus: five different bets
The same four questions for each of them. Which one fits depends less on the entry threshold than on what you are actually buying: time, a passport, or a tax position. Greece is the cheapest to enter and the more expensive to hold; the UAE is the fastest and offers no route to a European passport. Below is one card per jurisdiction, each leading to its own page.
Portugal
€500,000
- First permit
- 60 days by law, a year or more in practice
- Tax regime
- IFICI, 20% flat for 10 years
Greece
€400,000
- First permit
- Lawful residence on filing, card in months
- Tax regime
- Non-dom, €100,000 a year, separate €500,000 investment
Malta
€375,000
- First permit
- Not published; 6–12 months in practice
- Tax regime
- Remittance basis — but the permit gives no tax residence
UAE
AED 2,000,000
- First permit
- 7–10 working days published, 2–4 weeks end to end
- Tax regime
- No personal income tax
Cyprus
—
- First permit
- —
- Tax regime
- —
Each outline is drawn to the size of its card, so Malta appears as large as Portugal: these are identifying marks, not a map. Boundaries are simplified for legibility and are not a statement about any border.
Already living in Poland
Residence, work and business in Poland
For people who already live in Poland, the site has a separate section: not a sixth jurisdiction in the table above, but explanations built on the articles of Polish statutes. The temporary residence card and work, permanent residence and EU long-term residence, Polish citizenship, the PESEL number and a company of your own. Every figure is checked at its source and dated on the sources page.
What it really costs
What a golden visa costs in the first year, not the threshold
Every comparison in this niche publishes the entry threshold. Almost nobody publishes what it costs to get through it: transfer taxes, legal and registration fees, government charges and the first renewal are not optional — everyone pays them, every time. Below, both figures stand side by side, jurisdiction by jurisdiction, and the third is what you will actually spend in the first year.
Portugal
Advertised €500,000Everything else +€28,000
Real, first year €528,000Everything else 5.3%
Malta
Advertised €375,000Everything else +€126,000
Real, first year €501,000Everything else 25.1%
UAE
Advertised €466,000Everything else +€31,000
Real, first year €497,000Everything else 6.2%
Greece
Advertised €400,000Everything else +€35,000
Real, first year €435,000Everything else 8.0%
Sources
All figures in euro, converted where a jurisdiction sets its threshold in another currency, and checked against primary sources. A jurisdiction appears here only once both of its figures have been verified.
Leaving from
Choose the country you are leaving from and see all five routes
The five are not equally far from everywhere. Say where you live and which passport you hold — often not the same country — and the map shows what each of the five means from there: where you can simply move, and where a permit is the first thing to arrange. Nothing is sent anywhere. The two answers travel with you to the enquiry at the foot of this page.
Point at your country on the map, or use the fields under it.
Passport: {passport}. Where you live: {residence}. The right to move follows the passport; where you file, and which tax authority still has a claim on you, follows where you live.
- PortugalNo permit neededPermit needed
- GreeceNo permit neededPermit needed
- MaltaNo permit neededPermit needed
- CyprusNo permit neededPermit needed
- UAENo permit neededPermit needed
With this passport Portugal, Greece, Malta, and Cyprus are not a visa question at all: freedom of movement means you may move there and stay. Only the UAE asks for a permit.
With this passport all five ask for a permit. Which of them is the shorter route depends on the case, and that is what the comparison below is for.
Take this to the enquiryWhich route fits you
Three questions instead of an hour-long consultation
We ask for no name, no address and nothing about what is in your account. Three questions — the budget ceiling, how soon you need a first permit, and what matters most to you — and the summary rebuilds here: the real first-year cost, the timings and the tax position. Its figures are the ones in the table above, from the same primary sources. Nothing is sent anywhere until you press the button yourself.
- Portugal€500,000
- Greece€400,000
- Malta€375,000
- UAE€466,000
- Cyprusnot verified
Answer the questions on the left and the summary assembles here: the real first-year cost, the time to a first permit, and the tax position.
Greece
- Advertised
- €400,000
- Everything else, first year
- €35,000
- Real, first year
- €435,000
- First permit
- Lawful residence on filing, card in months
- Tax
- Non-dom, €100,000 a year, separate €500,000 investment
Malta
- Advertised
- €375,000
- Everything else, first year
- €126,000
- Real, first year
- €501,000
- First permit
- Not published; 6–12 months in practice
- Tax
- Remittance basis — but the permit gives no tax residence
UAE
- Advertised
- €466,000
- Everything else, first year
- €31,000
- Real, first year
- €497,000
- First permit
- 7–10 working days published, 2–4 weeks end to end
- Tax
- No personal income tax
Cyprus
- Advertised
- not verified
- Everything else, first year
- not verified
- Real, first year
- not verified
- First permit
- —
- Tax
- —
This jurisdiction's page is still in fact-checking.
Golden visa questions
Golden visa questions this niche answers evasively
These are the questions this niche usually answers evasively: what the threshold includes, who pays for renewals, whether we take a commission, and why one country is not in the table yet. The answers are short, checked against primary sources, and each carries the date it was verified. None of them is legal advice — rules change, and your case may not reduce to them.
- What is a golden visa, exactly?
- A residence permit granted because you placed a defined amount of money in the country — not because you have a job offer there, family there, or protection needs. That is the whole of the idea. It is not a passport and not a travel visa, and none of these five states calls it a golden visa in its own law: Portugal issues an ARI, Greece a residence permit for investment activity, Malta a permanent residence certificate, the UAE a ten-year golden residence. The marketing name is the market's, which is worth knowing before you read anyone else's page about it.
- Can I get residency without buying property?
- Yes, in four of the five. Portugal removed property from its Golden Visa in 2023 altogether — what is left is funds and job creation. Greece, Cyprus and Malta allow alternative routes, but their thresholds are usually higher.
- Where is the entry threshold lowest?
- On the threshold alone, Greece — but only in a narrow case most buyers do not qualify for. Since 1 September 2024 Greece has three tiers: €800,000 across Attica, the Thessaloniki regional unit, Mykonos, Thira and islands above 3,100 people; €400,000 everywhere else; and €250,000 only by exception, for converting premises to residential use, rebuilding an industrial building idle five years, or fully restoring a listed one — with the works finished before you file. Otherwise: Malta €375,000 to buy or €14,000 a year to rent, the UAE AED 2,000,000 (about €490,000 at 4.08), Portugal €500,000 into a fund. For Cyprus we publish no figure: the threshold in its regulation 6(2) could not be established from any primary source.
- Does the permit let me work anywhere in the EU?
- No. An investment residence permit lets you live in the issuing country and travel freely in Schengen, but it carries no right to work in other EU states. Working in the issuing country itself is usually allowed; the conditions differ.
- After how many years can I apply for citizenship?
- Malta about five years by naturalisation, Greece seven, Cyprus eight, Portugal seven for EU and Portuguese-speaking nationals and ten for everyone else — that last figure changed in May 2026 and used to be five. The UAE has no citizenship route here at all. Everywhere the clock counts years of actual legal residence, not years of holding the status, so a permit that requires a few days a year accrues nothing on its own.
- Do I have to live there to keep the status?
- To keep the permit, almost nowhere: a few days a year is usually enough. For citizenship, yes — actual residence is required, and this is where expectations diverge most often.
- Does buying property make me a tax resident?
- No. Tax residence is decided by days of presence and centre of vital interests, not by ownership. Buying a house and remaining a tax resident of your own country is an ordinary situation.
- What if the rules change after I apply?
- Applications are normally assessed under the rules in force on the filing date, but there is no guarantee: Portugal and Greece have both changed terms with a short transition. That is the main argument against a long gap between deciding and filing.
- Can I apply myself, without an adviser?
- On Malta, no — and it is the only one of the five where that is a legal requirement rather than a practical one. Regulation 4(1) states that an individual making any application under the programme shall use the services of an agent, and the agent must be licensed; since the 2025 amendment they are licensed directly by the Agency. Everywhere else the choice is yours, and the practical answer differs from the legal one: a file that sits in a queue for two years is a file somebody has to chase.
- Is the UAE really tax-free?
- There is no personal income tax, which is the part everyone repeats and it is true. What is left out is that this does not make every kind of income untaxed. Letting a property short-term requires a permit, and holding that permit changes the character of the income: rental receipts that sat outside corporate tax become business income that does not. There is also no annual property tax, which is unusual enough to be worth saying, and a 4% registration fee at purchase, which is market fact rather than an official published tariff and which we therefore name without adding to a total.
Answers are checked against primary sources and dated. None of them is legal advice — rules change, and your case may not reduce to them.
Leave an enquiry
Send an enquiry and get an answer from a firm in the jurisdiction you choose
Required: an address to reply to, and your consent to pass the enquiry on. The rest is there so the enquiry reaches a firm that handles this kind of case — residency, legalisation, a purchase, the tax side of it — rather than a call centre; the more specific the case, the shorter the first answer. It goes to one firm working in the jurisdiction you chose, and only if the consent box is ticked.
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