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.

Permanent residence programme

Moving to Malta: residency, tax and property

Malta is a narrow but expensive route: an English-speaking EU member whose programme is built from a property purchase, a €37,000 government contribution, a €60,000 administrative fee and a donation, all of them compulsory. It is also, since Portugal changed its nationality law, the shortest naturalisation period in this comparison — around five years of genuine residence.

From: €375,000
First permit: Not published; 6–12 months in practice
Tax regime: Remittance basis — but the permit gives no tax residence

The real number

What Malta actually costs

The threshold is the investment alone. Transfer taxes, professional and government fees and the first renewal are not optional — everyone pays them, every time.

Advertised: €375,000
Everything else: €126,000
Real, first year: €501,000

Sources Verified against primary sources on 23 August 2026 — statutes, ministry tariffs and official fee schedules. Figures are for ONE main applicant and cover entry and the first renewal; dependants are priced differently in every jurisdiction and are not included. Amounts in euro; the UAE threshold is AED 2,000,000 converted at 4.288 on the same date. See the working →

Who this route suits

Malta is the shortest naturalisation period in this comparison — roughly five years — and since Portugal moved to seven and ten in May 2026 that is no longer a close call. It is also the only English-speaking EU member here, which matters more than it sounds when the paperwork, the schools and the lawyers are all in one language you already read.

It does not suit anybody comparing headline thresholds. The property is the smallest part of the bill.

What stands behind the figure

€375,000 buys the property. On top of it, none of it optional: a €37,000 government contribution, a €60,000 administrative fee for the main applicant, a €2,000 donation to a registered NGO, 5% stamp duty on the higher of price or market value, and €500 per residence card. A dependant adds €7,500 — a spouse, minor children and differently-abled adult children are exempt from it.

Leasing instead of buying is €14,000 a year and no stamp duty, but the contribution, the administrative fee and the donation are identical, and the lease has to run five years.

You must also show capital of €500,000 including €150,000 in financial assets, or €650,000 including €75,000, and hold the property and the assets for five years from the appointed day.

What changed, and when

Twice, recently, and both times upward. L.N. 310 of 2024 applied from 1 January 2025; L.N. 146 of 2025 followed on 22 July 2025. Between them the purchase floor went to €375,000 with the old discount for the south of Malta and Gozo abolished outright, the contribution became a flat €37,000 for buying and leasing alike, and the per-dependant contribution was replaced by the €7,500 fee.

Separately: citizenship by investment is closed. After the Court of Justice of the European Union ruled against it in April 2025, the scheme was replaced by naturalisation for merit — science, sport, culture, philanthropy — where payment alone does not qualify.

After the first permit

Residency Malta publishes no processing time at all; the regulations allow eight months after the letter of approval in principle simply to complete the purchase and the payments, so six to twelve months end to end is the honest range.

The permit is immigration status and nothing else — it does not make you tax resident. If you separately become one, Malta taxes a non-domiciled resident on the remittance basis: foreign income taxed only when brought in, foreign capital gains never taxed even when brought in, with a €5,000 minimum tax where unremitted foreign income is €35,000 or more.

Sources: S.L. 217.26 under the Immigration Act as amended by L.N. 310 of 2024 and L.N. 146 of 2025; the MTCA guidance on the remittance basis; CJEU C-181/23.

Buying property here — Buying property in Malta: the permit, the 5% and the letting ban

Questions about Malta

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.

Ask about Malta

One partner works in each jurisdiction, and an enquiry reaches only them — and only if you tick the consent box. A person replies, usually within one working day.

Send an enquiry

We write when a rule changes

Not a newsletter. A short email when a threshold, a tax or a requirement in one of these jurisdictions becomes something else — with the statute and the date. There will not be many: across 2026 there have been fewer than ten such changes across five countries. The confirmation brings the four routes compared on one printable sheet.

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A confirmation is on its way, with the four-route comparison as a PDF. It also says what you signed up for and how to leave — one word in a reply.

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