Spain’s Golden Visa Is Gone: What the Repeal Teaches Investors

Spain no longer has a Golden Visa. Ley Orgánica 1/2025 repealed Spain’s investor visa provisions, and they stopped applying on 3 April 2025. Existing permits stay valid for their term, and Spain accepts no new investor applications.

Spain sat on many investors’ shortlists for years, so the repeal is a clear lesson in Golden Visa risk. This guide explains what changed, what it means for people who already applied or hold a permit, and what it tells you about choosing a programme today, including Portugal’s €500,000 fund route.

Key takeaways

• What happened: The official gazette published Ley Orgánica 1/2025 on 3 January 2025. It emptied articles 63 to 67 of Ley 14/2013, which held Spain’s investor visa rules, and the change took effect on 3 April 2025.
• Who is protected: Applications filed before 3 April 2025 can still be granted under the old rules, and valid permits keep their validity for the term they were issued for.
• Who is shut out: Nobody can file a new Spanish investor application.
• Not only Spain: Latvia stopped granting residence permits for real estate purchases on 15 September 2026.
• The lesson: A Golden Visa is an investment decision and a regulatory risk decision, and that risk runs on a timeline you do not control.
• Portugal: The fund threshold has been €500,000 since 1 January 2022, but Portugal ended its real estate route in October 2023, so stability is never a guarantee.

How the rules moved

Three countries, three kinds of change. Spain closed its investor route entirely. Latvia and Portugal closed the real estate route.

What happened to the Spain Golden Visa

Spain created its investor visa in Ley 14/2013. On 3 January 2025, the official gazette (BOE) published Ley Orgánica 1/2025. The twenty-first final provision of that law empties articles 63 to 67 of Ley 14/2013, the articles that held the investor visa and residence rules.

The repeal sat inside a law about the efficiency of the justice system, not an immigration law. It took effect three months after publication, on 3 April 2025.

What happens to existing holders and pending applications

The same law protects two groups through transitional provisions. Investors and family members who filed before the law took effect can still receive their visa or authorisation under the rules in force on the filing date. Visas and authorisations that were valid on the entry-into-force date keep their validity for the period they were issued for. Renewal requests are processed under the rules in force when the first authorisation was granted. All three rules come from the BOE text.

One caution applies. The renewal rule is headed as covering investors who bought real estate. If you hold a different type of Spanish investor permit, ask a Spanish immigration lawyer how the rule applies to you.

For anyone who had not filed by 3 April 2025, the door is closed.

Spain is not the only country that moved the goalposts

Latvia’s new Immigration Law took effect on 15 September 2026. Its immigration office says the law no longer lets Latvia grant residence permits to real estate purchasers.

Portugal changed too. The Mais Habitação housing reform ended the real estate route in October 2023, according to Connaught Law. The fund route stayed open. Portugal also raised the fund minimum to €500,000 for applications from 1 January 2022, according to LVP Advogados.

Taken together, the three cases show every kind of change an investor can face: a programme that disappears, an asset that stops qualifying, and a threshold that moves.

Why programme stability is part of the investment decision

A Golden Visa is not only an investment decision. It is a regulatory risk decision, and that risk runs on a timeline you do not control. A plan you make today has to survive the rules of the next two or three years.

Ask three questions before you choose a programme.

• How often have the rules changed? Read the programme’s history, not only today’s terms.
• What protects people who already applied or hold a permit? Spain’s law protected both groups, but only for filings made before the cut-off date.
• Which asset does the route depend on? Real estate routes closed in Latvia and Portugal.

Where Portugal stands

Portugal’s fund route requires €500,000 in units of a fund set up under Portuguese law. Under Decree-Law 14/2021, the fund must have at least five years left to run when you invest, and at least 60% of its investments must go to companies based in Portugal. That €500,000 threshold has applied since 1 January 2022, a period that includes the October 2023 housing reform.

Stability is not a guarantee. Portugal can change its rules too. Since 19 May 2026, citizenship also requires 10 years of legal residence for most applicants from outside the EU and the Portuguese-speaking world, so treat the Golden Visa as a residence route first.

Stability is not a glamorous selling point. It decides whether the plan you made two years ago still works. To see how Portugal compares with other programmes, read our Portugal vs Dubai and Portugal vs Cyprus comparisons.

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