The Spanish Consulate in Manchester covers Central UK. So if you live in the Midlands, the North West, Isle of Man or Wales, you’ll need to go to the Spanish Consulate in Manchester to apply for a Spanish residency visa.
There are three Spanish Consulates in the UK that handle Spanish residency visa applications. The Spanish Consulate in Edinburgh covers the North of England, Scotland and Northern Ireland. So if you live in one of these areas, you’ll need to go to the Spanish Consulate in Edinburgh to apply for a Spanish residency visa.
Importing a high value car from the UK in Spain post Brexit, now comes with added costs. As the UK is no longer in the EU and the standard process to import and register a UK car in Spain now involves customs.
This means on top of the registration tax which in most cases will be 17% of the vehicle value, 10% customs duty and 21% VAT will apply, unless you can find away around it.
Paying nearly £50k to register a £100k motor is simply not a consideration. There are however various ways these huge costs can be avoided, bringing the cost of importing and registering high value cars in Spain down to a few thousand Euros, rather than tens of thousands.
The Spanish Non-Lucrative Visa offers residency to British nationals who have the financial means to support themselves without working. The Spanish Non-Lucrative Visa scheme is therefore ideal if you are retired or have passive income, for example from a portfolio of properties or other investments. The Spanish Non-Lucrative Visa allows full-time residency in Spain.
Spain’s Golden Visa offers residency to individuals who make a real estate investment in Spain of €500,000 or more. The Golden Visa scheme has been in existence since September 2013 when legislation for the ‘residency by investment scheme’ was passed. The aim being to attract foreign investors at a time when the economy of Spain was not in a very good place. Since it’s inception, over 25,000 foreign investors have benefited from the scheme.
The scheme is open to nationals from non-EU or third countries, and has so far been most popular with investors from China, Russia and the USA.
The Spanish Golden Visa offers residency to individuals who make a real estate investment in Spain of €500,000 or more. The Spanish Golden Visa scheme has been in existence since September 2013 when legislation for the ‘residency by investment scheme’ was passed. The aim being to attract foreign investors at a time when the economy of Spain was not in a very good place. Since it’s inception, over 25,000 foreign investors have benefited from the scheme.
The main nationalities benefiting have been Chinese, Russian and US. However now that the UK is no longer in the EU, Spain can expect to receive, if it’s not doing so already, significant numbers of Spanish Golden Visa applications from British Nationals who wish to enjoy their holiday residence, without the 90 day Schengen limitation.
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The TIE, Tarjeta de Indentidad de Extranjero, is the Spanish identification card for citizens from third countries (non-EU) who reside in Spain. The Withdrawal Agreement TIE is a special version of this card, issued to British UK nationals who have retained EU rights under the terms of the Brexit Withdrawal Agreement.
The qualifying requirements for applicants e.g. for proof of means remain the same as they were when the UK was in the EU. British UK nationals living in Spain who had not obtained a residency certificate, had until the 31st December 2020 to apply for the the Withdrawal Agreement TIE.
You can now only apply for the Withdrawal Agreement TIE in these circumstances:
If you’re not a Spanish citizen and want to live in Spain, you have to obtain Spanish residency. The process that you have to follow to get Spanish residency depends on your nationality, whether you are from an EU country, and if not, what you plan to do whilst you are a Spanish resident.
Nationals of member states of the European Union and Switzerland, as well as other countries party to the agreement on the European Economic Area, have an unconditional right to reside in Spain. Nationals of countries aside from these, are able to gain residency based on achieving other qualifying conditions and in most cases need to obtain a visa.
For someone planning to live long term in Spain, temporary Spanish residency is the first step towards getting permanent resident status, which can be applied for after 5 years. Thereafter if someone so wishes, they can apply for Spanish citizenship after completing 10 years of permanent residency in Spain.
Spanish residency requirements for British citizens / UK nationals changed on January 1st 2021 when the UK left the EU.
British citizens / UK nationals now have to follow the same process as other non-EU national citizens of third countries to get Spanish residency, i.e. there is a requirement to first obtain a visa.
The minimum income required for a British Citizen / UK national to obtain a residency visa, is a lot higher than it was to get residency before Brexit. In most cases a single applicant needs to have at least €27k per year, whereas previously less than €6k income would have been sufficient.
You also have to obtain a police criminal check report, and medical certificates are also required as part of the visa application.