A year ago, I moved to Portugal in a bid to regain EU residency – and enjoy the glorious sunshine, beaches, cuisine and local culture.
Why Portugal?
Once we Brits were free to travel again after the pandemic, it quickly became clear that anyone who habitually spends a large part of the year in the EU would have to be very careful about not exceeding the time limit imposed by Brexit. This Schengen calculator is handy for calculating your allowance.
Much as I adore Italy, where I owned a house until last year, I didn’t want to apply for Italian residency as it’s not the best EU scheme available. Portugal, on the other hand, consistently tops all the lists. So I began to do some research. It dawned on me that if I moved to the East Algarve near the Spanish border, I could fulfil a long-held dream of living by the sea and be close to my eldest son Jack, who lives in Seville.
In the end, I settled on Tavira as my destination as this tends to feature in most “best small town in Portugal” lists. I found someone (via Facebook) who helped me find a flat with a one-year lease (a requirement for the visa application), open a bank account and get my tax number (NIF) – all from the comfort of home in Cardiff.
I applied for the Portuguese D7 National Visa or passive income visa. All the info is here. The application has to be made through VFS Global, a company that handles visa applications for many countries, including Portugal. The centre for Welsh residents is Manchester.
I had my visa interview on 9 November 2022 and was granted my visa just before Christmas 2022.
It’s entirely possible to do the whole process yourself and much assistance can be found on these Facebook groups for UK and US migrants (the procedure for US citizens is more or less the same as for UK ones and you can find a host of resources in the Files section of bothFacebook pages).
Facebook really is your friend when embarking on an adventure like this.
What’s it like?
Five months into my new life and I’m loving it. Since I arrived in Santa Luzia, a small fishing village just outside Tavira, everything has consistently exceeded expectations.
I like the pace of a smaller town and the fact it’s on the Ria Formosa – a salt marsh nature reserve that extends along the coast from Faro to the Spanish border.
The place is teeming with fauna and fauna – I regularly see flamingos. There are all kinds of wildflowers and intoxicating wafts of orange blossom from early spring.
I was able to do long walks on the unspoilt beaches and salt pans with my dog before the tourists started arriving in June and it got too hot.
Portugal is also one of the sunniest places in Europe and the Atlantic breeze keeps it a few degrees cooler than nearby Andalusia.
I was really part of my local community in Italy and I’m aware it will take years to achieve the same level of integration in Portugal. In the meantime I’m meeting lots of other immigrants – mainly Americans, Brits and Italians.
All of us new arrivals are keen to meet new friends and get advice about settling in – so there’s a ready-made social plenty of clubs, meet-ups and events to enjoy. I try to give something back to my new-found community by joining a beach cleanup team once a week.
The bureaucracy inevitably takes some navigation, but the Portuguese health service is great and foreigners can benefit from a special tax scheme for the first 10 years.
My goals are to get to know more of the country and learn Portuguese (of course) while spending as much time as I can in the UK supporting my 93-year-old Dad – I can spend up to 4 months a year in the UK and still maintain my status as a Portuguese resident.
I will need to renew my residency for a further 3-year period once my current 2-year period has expired. After 5 years, I’m entitled to permanent residency and a Portuguese passport. In the meantime, I’m free to roam the rest of the EU.
I’m really glad to have taken this step. It feels like a small personal victory over Brexit and the chance to live an idyllic life by the sea for two thirds of the year. I’ll raise a glass of Vinho Verde to that!
