Europe is becoming increasingly hostile to Golden Visas.
That does not mean Europe is becoming hostile to wealthy investors.
The distinction is important.
For more than a decade, European governments used residence-by-investment programmes to attract foreign capital. Investors bought property. Governments received investment. Developers built projects. Lawyers and advisers created a new industry around the programmes.
The model worked.
Until it became politically unpopular.
Today, Europe appears to be fighting a war against the Golden Visa.
But I think the real target is narrower.
It is the passive investment migration model.
The distinction may determine what survives.
Portugal Has Crossed the Line
Portugal is probably the clearest example.
The Portuguese Golden Visa was one of Europe’s great investment migration success stories. It attracted billions of euros of foreign investment, much of it into real estate.
That eventually became politically difficult to defend.
The government linked the programme to the wider housing affordability debate and moved to eliminate the property route.
In October 2023, Portugal formally enacted Law No. 56/2023, preventing new applications under several of the traditional investment routes, including the routes based on the acquisition of real estate. At the same time, the legislation preserved other qualifying investment routes, including collective investment structures. Existing permits were not simply erased; the law provided for their renewal under specified conditions.
The message was significant.
Portugal was not saying:
“We do not want foreign capital.”
It was saying:
“We do not want this particular type of foreign capital.”
As I argued in Portugal’s Golden Visa: When Success Becomes a Problem, the success of the programme had itself become part of the political problem.
That distinction will shape the next phase of European investment migration.
The European Commission Started the Debate
Portugal’s decision did not occur in isolation.
The European Commission had been examining investor citizenship and residence schemes for years. In its 2019 report on investor citizenship and residence schemes, the Commission identified concerns including security, money laundering, tax evasion and corruption, and called for greater transparency and effective oversight. See European Commission: Investor Citizenship and Residence Schemes in the EU.
The geopolitical environment then accelerated the debate.
In March 2022, following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the Commission urged Member States to take immediate action concerning investor citizenship and residence schemes, including the repeal of investor citizenship schemes and enhanced scrutiny of investor residence programmes.
The political direction was therefore already established.
Golden Visas were increasingly being viewed not simply as immigration programmes, but as part of a broader question of European security, economic policy and public legitimacy.
Why Did Golden Visas Become a Problem?
The answer is partly political.
A government can explain why it wants foreign direct investment.
It can explain why it wants international businesses.
It can explain why it wants entrepreneurs, scientists and highly skilled workers.
It is harder to explain why a wealthy foreign national should receive a residence permit because he purchased an apartment, particularly when local residents are struggling to buy one.
This creates a political asymmetry.
The investor sees a €500,000 property investment.
The local population sees another foreign buyer competing for limited housing.
The economic value may be substantial.
But the political optics are different.
That is why the issue has become much larger than immigration policy.
The Property Problem
The fundamental weakness of the Golden Visa property model is concentration.
If international capital flows into factories, businesses or infrastructure, the investment potentially expands economic capacity.
If international capital flows into existing residential property, it primarily changes ownership and demand.
That does not mean property investment has no economic benefit.
It clearly does.
Construction creates jobs. Renovation creates activity. Taxes are generated. Developers receive capital.
But the benefits are not always evenly distributed.
And when housing becomes politically sensitive, governments have to consider more than the gross amount of foreign investment.
The question becomes whether the capital is adding economic capacity or simply competing for assets that domestic residents already need.
Greece Is Now the Test
Greece presents an interesting contrast.
Rather than eliminate its Golden Visa, Greece increased the minimum property investment in certain high-demand areas from €250,000 to €500,000 from August 1, 2023, while retaining the lower threshold elsewhere. Enterprise Greece reported that the programme had attracted more than €5 billion of investment over its first decade, mainly in real estate, with around 13,000 visas issued.
This is effectively a different response to the same political problem.
Portugal restricted the product.
Greece modified the price and geography.
Neither approach fundamentally changes the fact that residential property remains at the centre of the Greek programme.
The question is whether that remains sustainable over the long term.
As I discussed in Greece: The New European Golden Visa Leader?, Greece had emerged as one of the principal alternatives for investors who wanted European residence through property.
That position now carries both an opportunity and a political risk.
Spain Is Still Open
Spain is another important part of the story.
As of January 2024, Spain continued to offer its Golden Visa, including the €500,000 real estate route. Spanish law also provided alternative investment routes involving Spanish public debt, Spanish companies, investment funds, bank deposits and qualifying business projects.
This creates an obvious competitive opportunity.
If Portugal exits the property market and Greece becomes more expensive in selected locations, capital will look for alternatives.
Spain can potentially capture some of that demand.
But Spain also faces the same underlying political question.
How long can a government justify granting residence through residential property investment when housing affordability is increasingly politically important?
At the time this article was written, Spain had not yet announced the abolition of the property route. That would come later.
The important point in January 2024 was that the Spanish model remained available while the political debate surrounding property-based investment migration was intensifying.
The Investor Is Not the Enemy
This is where governments need to be careful.
The wealthy foreign investor is often treated as though he is the cause of the housing problem.
That is too simplistic.
Housing affordability is driven by many factors: planning restrictions, construction costs, interest rates, population growth, domestic demand, supply shortages, rental regulation, urban concentration and foreign investment.
Golden Visas may contribute to demand in particular markets.
But they are not responsible for the entire housing problem.
Governments should therefore be careful not to confuse a politically attractive target with the underlying economic problem.
The €500,000 Question
There is another issue.
If €250,000 is politically unacceptable, does €500,000 solve the problem?
Not necessarily.
The investor is still buying property.
The only difference is that the investor is buying a more expensive property.
That may reduce the number of qualifying investors.
But it does not fundamentally alter the economic structure.
The real question is not:
How much should the investor spend?
It is:
What should the investor spend the money on?
That is a much more interesting policy question.
Capital Can Be Redirected
Governments have alternatives.
Instead of encouraging investment into residential property, they can encourage investment into private companies, infrastructure, renewable energy, technology, healthcare, tourism, development, venture capital, private equity and investment funds.
This changes the conversation.
The government can say:
We want your capital, but we want it working in the economy.
That is a much stronger political proposition.
It is also the direction suggested by Portugal’s post-property model.
This Is Where Funds Become Important
Investment funds offer governments something that individual property purchases do not.
They can define an investment mandate.
They can establish eligibility criteria.
They can require minimum holding periods.
They can identify sectors.
They can provide reporting.
They can be professionally managed.
And they can potentially distribute capital across multiple investments.
Portugal’s post-Golden-Visa framework illustrates this direction.
The property route has been removed, while qualifying collective investment structures remain part of the investment landscape.
As I wrote in Why Investment Funds Are Replacing Real Estate in Migration Programmes, this represents a fundamental shift from property ownership towards capital allocation.
This is not the end of investment migration.
It is a change in its architecture.
The War Is Really Against Passivity
I therefore think the phrase “war on Golden Visas” is slightly misleading.
Europe is not necessarily against wealthy people obtaining residence.
It is increasingly uncomfortable with passive residence-by-investment.
That distinction matters.
A wealthy entrepreneur establishing a company in Europe is different from buying an apartment.
A private equity investor financing European businesses is different from purchasing a holiday home.
An infrastructure investor is contributing capital in a different way.
The investor may ultimately receive the same immigration benefit.
But the economic relationship is completely different.
Investment Migration Is Growing Up
For the first generation of the industry, simplicity was an advantage.
Buy a property.
Submit the paperwork.
Receive residence.
The model was easy to understand and easy to market.
The next generation will be more complicated.
Investors will need to understand the investment. They will need to understand the fund manager, the underlying assets, tax, exit conditions and the immigration rules.
In other words, investment migration is moving closer to wealth management.
That is not necessarily a negative development.
It may be precisely what the industry needs.
The HNWI Does Not Want Another Problem
This is also important from the investor’s perspective.
A €500,000 apartment is not automatically an attractive investment.
The investor needs to consider:
What is the yield?
What are the running costs?
What is the liquidity?
What is the exit market?
What happens if property prices fall?
What happens if the Golden Visa changes?
The immigration benefit may justify accepting some investment risk.
But it should not justify making a bad investment.
The best programmes will therefore be those where the underlying investment makes sense independently of the immigration benefit.
That is ultimately the test of whether investment migration is genuinely becoming part of wealth management.
The Golden Visa Industry Needs to Change
There is a broader lesson for the industry.
For years, Golden Visa businesses were heavily connected to real estate.
Developers.
Property agents.
Law firms.
Immigration advisers.
The next generation will require different expertise.
Fund managers.
Investment advisers.
Private banks.
Tax advisers.
Corporate lawyers.
Compliance professionals.
Asset managers.
That is a more institutional industry.
And, ultimately, I think that is a healthier one.
The industry will have to sell investment quality rather than simply immigration eligibility.
Governments Also Have a Choice
Governments now face a strategic decision.
They can simply close their programmes.
Or they can redesign them.
Closing is easier.
Redesigning is harder.
But redesigning allows a country to retain access to international capital while changing the type of investment it attracts.
That is potentially much more valuable.
The objective should not be:
How do we get rid of Golden Visas?
It should be:
How do we make investment migration economically sustainable?
That is a much more constructive question.
There Is Still Strong Demand
The demand has not disappeared.
The wealthy remain internationally mobile.
Families still want geographic diversification.
Investors still want access to Europe.
Entrepreneurs still want European bases.
Parents still want options for their children.
And wealthy families still want contingency plans.
The demand is therefore structural.
The product is changing because governments are changing the rules.
That distinction is crucial.
If demand is structural but the product is politically unstable, the opportunity will migrate towards jurisdictions capable of creating more durable investment frameworks.
The New Competition
This creates an interesting competitive environment.
Countries that close their programmes may lose capital.
Countries that maintain them may attract that capital.
But countries that simply maintain the old property model may eventually face the same political problems.
The real competitive advantage may therefore belong to countries that can offer something different.
A stable legal system.
A credible investment framework.
Professional fund management.
Economic substance.
A predictable immigration regime.
And a genuine reason for wealthy investors to participate.
The lowest threshold may not be the strongest proposition.
The strongest proposition may be the one that offers the best combination of residence and investment quality.
Europe Has Not Lost Interest in Wealth
This is perhaps the biggest misconception.
Europe remains one of the world’s most attractive regions for wealthy individuals.
It has infrastructure, education, healthcare, culture, financial markets, business opportunities and connectivity. It contains some of the world’s most established wealth centres.
The fact that one particular investment migration product is becoming politically unpopular does not change that.
It simply means that Europe is becoming more selective about how it wants to attract wealth.
This distinction is particularly important for policymakers.
A country can reject passive property investment without rejecting international capital.
It can close one door while opening another.
The Next Golden Visa
The next Golden Visa will probably look very different from the last one.
It may not involve a house.
It may involve a fund.
It may involve a company.
It may involve infrastructure.
It may involve venture capital.
It may involve private equity.
The investor will still receive an immigration benefit.
But the government will want to see something more than a property transaction.
It will want economic participation.
That is the direction Portugal has already begun to take.
The War Has a Positive Side
There is therefore a positive interpretation of Europe’s Golden Visa crackdown.
It could force the industry to become more professional.
It could eliminate weak investment products.
It could reduce the dependence on residential property.
It could create more productive investment.
It could bring fund management and investment migration closer together.
And it could ultimately create better outcomes for both governments and investors.
The transition will not be painless.
Some developers will lose a source of capital.
Some programmes will disappear.
Some investors will have to reconsider their strategies.
But the underlying market will survive.
Indeed, it may become stronger precisely because the easiest version of the product is disappearing.
The Real Battle
The real battle is not between Europe and wealthy investors.
It is between passive capital and productive capital.
Europe does not need to choose between welcoming wealth and protecting its housing markets.
It can design investment migration programmes that do both.
The question is whether governments have the sophistication to design them.
And whether the industry has the professionalism to deliver them.
The Golden Visa is not dead.
But the old Golden Visa is.
The future belongs to programmes where immigration status is linked not simply to what an investor buys, but to what the investor contributes.
That is a much harder product to build.
But it may also be a much more sustainable one.