Portugal Golden Visa is one of the most popular residence by investment schemes around the world. Since its inception in 2012, the program has generated 4.91 billion euros as of October 2019. Considering the ever-growing performance of the program, authorities expect the scheme to pass beyond the 5 billion mark by the end of the year.
To be able to satisfy the demands of the applicants, Portugal鈥檚 Foreigners and Borders Services (SEF) recently held a press conference and announced that for the remaining period of 2019 additional 11 thousand appointments are to be held. Also, SEF announced that they will be employing new assistants to increase their appointment capacity. As it will increase the capacity of reply by the SEF, it will also reduce the overall time taken by the processes of application and appointment.
The demand increase in the Portugal Golden Visa program is clearly apparent in the numbers presented by the SEF. First half of 2019 performed a 24% increase in appointments. The number of appointments held in the first half of the year was 155 thousand. For the second half, this number is expected to increase even more as the last two months typically show an increase in the demand.
Moreover, the success rate of the appointments has also increased. For instance, the SEF issued 76,940 new residency cards which points to an impressive growth of 68 per cent. Portugal鈥檚 Golden Visa program keeps breaking its own records. More than 93 thousand Portugal residence permits were issued in 2018 which was a record number according to SEF鈥檚 reports. However, 2019, even in the first 6 months performed amazingly, processed many appointments and resulted in almost 77 thousand new residence permits. Therefore, only a miracle would keep Portugal from breaking its own record in the remaining period of the year.
With its efforts in increasing the efficiency and overall performance of the program, SEF shows its dedication to the Portugal Golden Visa process and success. Introducing a new method of application in the last year, SEF also changed the profile of the program. With the newly introduced venture capital funds investment option, the distribution of investments in the country changes day by day. Since its inception, the program鈥檚 most popular method of investment was the real estate option. However, with a lower minimum investment requirement and nice potential of positive outcomes, venture capital funds slowly gains percentage in the overall share of different investments.
