Getting the non-lucrative visa has changed.
You may not be able to get an appointment to apply and not just that, but many consulates are taking longer and the requirements have gotten stricter and that’s where Sabine comes in.
Hey, Sabine, how are you? Hi, I’m good.
Thank you, James.
It’s very nice being here.
I’m immigration specialist.
I work at Bureaucracy Spain and we actually in the real time we help families relocate to Spain with the specific non-lucrative visa and another visa type but today we are focused on the non-lucrative visa.
Yeah, of course you also do digital nomad visa.
I know, but yeah, we’re focusing on non-lucrative visa, which like all visas in Spain, like immigration, there’s always a little bit of flux and things are changing.
And I know you’re very humble, Sabine.
And I just want to add that you, you know, you and your team have a 99.
5% approval rate, uh, which, you know, makes you the perfect person obviously to dive into these kind of curly topics around non-lucrative visa.
We’re going to dive into timeline challenges at the moment, unofficial updates.
You know, sometimes these laws are updated officially, but sometimes there’s kind of changes behind the scenes and also some of the actual legal updates that did happen in the last year or so.
But before we get into the latest updates and changes, can you just remind anybody who’s just coming at this new, you know, what is the non-lucrative visa? Uh, and who is it for? Yes.
Well, the non-lucrative visa is a visa that is based on passive income.
So, unfortunately, this visa doesn’t allow anyone to work anywhere.
I know there’s a little bit of kind of confusion, but if I don’t work in Spain, does it still apply? Unfortunately, yes.
You must have a passive income and sustainable healthy healthy financial situation, but you cannot actively work anywhere.
And of course, it’s not only for official retirees.
So, you can take a sabatical, you can take a year off always if we have enough proof.
But definitely I would say the the general rule it’s a nonworking visa.
Yeah, I think that’s really important.
There’s always been a little bit of well it used to be a little less clear.
There were people working on it but that is very clear now in the law that this is not one where you can actively work.
doesn’t mean you know you can have passive income and we’ll come into that actually now because it’ll be good before we get into these sort of timeline challenges that are very up tothe- minute you know again give give everyone watching just an overview of the key requirements to apply uh for the non-lucrative visa the biggest three key points that I like to highlight that could be why you would not be eligible so you need to be ready to stop working that’s the thing and especially we need to stop working before the appointment.
So that’s important to acknowledge.
You cannot keep working while your visa is under process unfortunately.
Then of course you have to have enough financial situation to sustain yourself without working during the next year.
Of course depending on your long-term goals and depending on the number of people in the family applying.
And then the next thing I would say is a clean criminal record.
They will see all of all of the criminal record.
And if there is something 20 years ago, depending on what it is, it also could be a risk.
So that’s something that we need to look at.
The rest of them is just a paperwork and and and showing it all good on paper.
But as long as you have good financial situation, clean criminal record, and you are okay of stopped working before the appointment, we are good to go.
And if anyone’s watching and you’re thinking, okay, what does this mean to have be able to afford living in Spain? like you know although this changes each year you know the current requirements what would be the current annual sa you know savings required to show or passive income to show for a couple for example for a couple we need to show either €3,000 in passive income or directly 36,000 in savings or investments and this is not that you need both or you need one or the other you can mix them so if you have a pension of €2,000 you just need to show the rest of €24,000 And if you need 36, that leaves you with €12,000 in savings.
So you can mix them up.
That’s fine.
And I think for a lot of people that is not necessarily a big threshold to get over.
Obviously you never want to be right on the minimum.
You want to have a little bit extra, but I think you know at least gives that that gives some context.
So let’s jump into really the topic for today, which are these timeline challenges that people are facing these unofficial kind of rule changes.
And let’s tackle I think timeline first because there have been some developments here in terms of getting an actual appointment and long approval time.
So let’s start with appointment challenges and I see this constantly through you know my community people struggling with this.
So let’s just set the scene.
There are two places or two potential places to apply for the non-lucrative visa depending on where you live right.
It could be BLS or the Spanish consulate that is in your region directly.
So just work us through how that works.
These two, you know, people might be seeing the words the the the acronym BLS.
It’s like what the hell is that? Right.
Tell help us understand.
Well, really the BLS is like a front desk that organizes and accepts the application.
So they are the one dealing with the in andoff appointments.
However, this the the application actually will be managed by the consulate and they will decide.
So currently in United States, Boston and New York are the only if I’m not mistaken if they’re they are only consulates that actually don’t work with BLS.
So the the process of working is a little bit different because instead of registering in the BLS website to get the the appointment, you write an email to the consulate and of course they don’t respond in 24 hours.
It can take a week or two to actually re respond.
While in the BLS you just keep checking the appointment availability there at that time used to just be you always went to your consulate but now the Spanish government is is outsourcing as you say the kind of the front desk the receipt of the application to what is a private company uh actually you know BLS is the best way for someone to understand what consulate uh they apply to I mean and you know you can just Google it in many cases and often on the consulate pages there’s there’s a page that says if you live in you Nebraska, you you apply here to this consulate and we’ll also tell you if you apply directly to the consulate or if there’ll be a link to the BLS website uh on the actual consulate page.
Is that is that the best instructions there? Yes, because each consulate has its jurisdictional areas.
So, you must show that you live in that specific area and actually there’s a cheat sheet that you can check.
So, there’s each and every consulate in the United States and it says which areas belong to that specific consulate.
Of course, my memory and my geographical map is not excellent.
So, I personally always double check because it’s important, especially because you cannot be confident of what is out there, the information, because the specific consulate you go to might have specific needs.
So, it’s not the same as you apply from New York or from Miami.
The application is slightly different and it it changes a lot.
Yeah, I’m glad you said that.
You have to really be careful when you’re listening to what people are saying like, you know, this is the requirement.
I mean, obviously the financial requirements are the financial requirements, but there is nuance depending on the different concept requirements.
You know, some ask for accommodation proof and it’s based on your residence, right? So, where you actually live, you know, where you have your driver’s license and your your your registered as living is is Yes.
Okay.
Yes.
But you can also change it.
So, we have seen that of course families say, “Oh, well, I’m selling my house in in in New York and I’m planning to go to live with my family in LA.
” So, you do need to know you will need to switch that driver’s license and change it.
So, it’s important to understand the process there, but you can change areas if of course that’s your personal situation and we can reflect it well on the on the application.
I’ve even seen people do kind of consulate shopping to get to easier consulates, but that’s a whole another topic.
I don’t want to get into that.
So, people are having real challenges getting appointments right now.
Whether it’s with the consulate, but in many cases it’s with these BLS websites where you go and you ask for your appointment to submit your non-lucrative visa application.
People are having real challenges.
So, give us the current situation across the kind of the main consulate.
Well, this is a little bit seasonal.
Well, I have to say every year we see that in summer or before summer some consulates kind of jump on the summer train a little bit early than others.
But that’s also because of the student visas.
So of course student visa process is quicker and instead of 3 months of approval time they have only one month.
So in summer they are prioritizing student visa appointments and submission terms and of course how many people can apply.
So during summer every year, this is very normal and I mean it is what it is.
The only way around it is to be more prepared starting a little bit earlier on your visa to avoid yourself a lot of stress.
But then of course uh during the whole year this appointment uh getting is a struggle for us as well.
Of course I mean let’s say Washington DC is still a very common consulate.
There’s no difficulties there.
Usually the normal route is that you can get an appointment like 30 days in advance from one month month to another.
Then we have found ourselves in a situation where maybe for specific concerts like LA you’d need to be spending few weeks up to a month maybe a little bit more to actually keep checking because daily right and multiple times checking daily even though generally they say h they advise to check the a day of month or the beginning of month in the mornings but I have to say it’s worthwhile entering few times just to see if there’s a cancellation if someone cancelled many people plans change so there might be cancellations or suddenly there is an opening so we just need to be persistent and patient unfortunately but I mean it’s what it is at this time yeah no I’m glad you gave that context so if I’m going into my application coming up to summer I should expect it to be harder to get an appointment at other times it’s consulate dependent this changes obviously you know working with you guys one of the services or you know benefits is that you’re seeing the patterns right because you’re making hundreds of applications so you’re seeing which consulates are trending to better or worse and you’re giving that context to to your clients so if we think about uh consulate uh you know actual tactics I’ve seen people say like I’ve been trying for a month I must have tried 250 times I go on to the website nothing’s available uh you know you’ve mentioned a couple like trying end of month start of month if we were to list out just a few kind of best practices if the baseline is be persistent.
Check the BLS website.
Keep checking.
Keep checking daily.
Um so that we can see if appointments open up.
Is there any other best practices that you can add? Uh even though this thing is obviously always in flux.
Also something that helped a lot was to understand that even though there is an option to submit for family appointment, the family appointments either they are never published or there’s very few slots.
It’s instead of getting the whole appointment for the family, you must have individual appointments.
So the probability to get those is much bigger.
We have even tried to to to clean the cash like the cache the cookies in your because sometimes cash.
Yeah.
Cash.
I I never know how to say on your computer, right? Yeah.
Like cleaning that in your computer because sometimes it even gives problems because there’s like so many people entering.
So you kind of need to be almost proactive in that sense.
the appointments are released in from a central.
So it is the 8 uh 9:00 a.
m.
US east coast.
So that actually means 6:00 a.
m.
in in the Pacific coast.
Okay.
Now, I’m not sure and I would not put my hand in the fire to make that that is really the case.
I would still try in different hours just to make sure like I have done everything.
And also maybe you can save the the intents because sometimes we have written to the console like hey this is struggle what is happening trying in the morning is maybe a good idea daily being persistent clearing your your cash on your computer and are they generally released daily is it once a month you know you said maybe there can be some cancellations during the month yes we often have seen that the last week though I wouldn’t say exactly a day but there’s the last week or closer to like 30th they open the slots for the next month.
So, at the end of the month, they do like the recap and they open slots for the next month.
I know another challenge that people have had is the consulate website lists the requirements, the paperwork requirements to apply for the non-lucrative visa and so does the BLS website for the same, you know, consulate, the same district, right? Sometimes those lists can be a little bit different or at least express things a little bit differently.
How do we deal with this uncertainty around the list of documents required or the nuance around the documents? I mean it’s difficult to give you an answer because even if we check the same page in English and in Spanish and I’m not sure if it’s the interpretation of the language.
It’s the they don’t match or sometimes they contradict.
So of course proact the English and the Spanish on the on the consulate page for example.
Yeah.
Yes.
So they don’t up to date.
So we cannot trust what is there.
We need to kind of fight back and say unfortunately I know what it says there but it’s not updated.
So it’s misleading.
So again maybe community a friend that has gone through the web the through the consulate and has experienced it recently or working with a professional that simply is there all the time experiencing the changes because unfortunately they don’t update it.
It’s it’s a struggle and we will get into this.
I’m glad you mentioned the changes around that.
Usually in the past you if you were going to be retired in Spain, you were able to work be working at the time of your visa appointment with a promise to retire in the future.
But that’s changed.
We’ll get to that cuz that’s a biggie for a lot of people.
First, I just want to touch on one last thing that really gives people, you know, frustrates people around BLS, you know, for these uh applying, and that’s that it seems like BLS, which is a private company, suddenly throws on a whole bunch of surprise fees when you go to actually you think your application is all good.
You got your folder, you filled out, did all the requirements, and suddenly they’re like, “Oh, we’re going to charge you this for another photo or photocopy.
” What’s going on here? And is there any way people can avoid getting hit with unnecessary costs? Definitely being overprepared can avoid this because we have found situations where double checking on the website on the BLS in the requirements the photo needs to be one size and the client goes with that size and then then suddenly they say oh well this size is not the right one but don’t worry we will charge you and we will do you the photo or for doing a photo copy or maybe a an address in forms sometimes it’s Spanish address sometimes it’s US address and They switch it once in a while to make it more exciting, I suppose, for them and to make more money.
I suspect they’re incentivized.
They’ve got a whole part of their of their revenue stream is extra charges realistically.
And of course, I mean, you are there in an appointment.
You are stressed.
You want this to go get over with and they will just you will pay.
You need to be prepared for that.
They’ve got you there, haven’t they? Yeah.
Yes.
They got you there.
And if you don’t pay well then say okay well then we cannot accept your application.
What we as a company do we definitely want to be overprepared.
we we share all this information so you don’t get unpleasant surprise either and uh being just uh we know certain BLS offices are more maybe propens to do this than others and we just try to to inform as much as we can because sometimes it is what it is and you need to be at least when you know it you go prepared you say okay I will I will need to pay something extra yeah that’s frustrating let’s jump on to approvals so we’ve talked about application where obviously people are having challenges people are having some challenges on the other end like they’ve appi applied and they’re waiting to get approved.
So legally consulates have 3 months to approve a non-lucrative visa but some are taking longer now.
Uh what is the you know and you might go in thinking well look worst case scenario I’m going to find out in 3 months because you’re trying to plan when you actually move right you’re trying to figure that out and you you do put a proposed move date on your application.
Um so what’s the actual situation now? What should people expect around this? I have to say it’s a little bit inconsistent because up until up until recently, for example, Los Angeles and Miami, which were one of the fastest consulates in Miami, I have personally had approval in a week, few months ago, it took us like 4 months and we were so surprised and there was like, well, it is what it is and then suddenly they changed to 2 months.
So, I don’t know, maybe there was a internal crisis of of staff, for example.
So it’s really inconsistent and it’s not like other visas have okay well this time specific time passed so it’s administrative silence unfortunately with the consulate they do not have that they can take whatever they take the time however not always it means that it’s not approved so once you go into the consulate usually they share with you like the the tracking the yeah code yeah a code to keep to see your visa updates So sometimes we have seen that the person has been assigned with the NIE number already and it’s like what is this? So usually that means you need to reach out to them.
You can give them a call.
You can send an email and say what is the status and sometimes we have found that the visa has been approved but they weren’t notified.
So again if we work with the families that are in this situation we we always advise to reach out to them.
if you live close to the consulate or the BLS just pass by say hey what’s happening this is my visa this is the timing and they can tell you no no it’s still under under review or oh well it has been approved so we need to always keep an eye on them because unfortunately the organization is a little bit um inconsistent I would say someone recently said in my community that this is just sort of preparing people for bureaucracy in Spain but I actually think this is worse in a lot of cases such it’s such high stakes, right? It’s the one of the biggest most high stakes things.
So, I really empathize with with people’s frustration and anxiety around this working with a firm like yourselves uh or an immigration firm.
Yeah.
Okay.
You’re going to apply according to best practices for the application.
But part of the service inherently is also understanding these unwritten kind of rules, seeing these trends and helping you man helping people manage timeline, right? Because this is actually the biggest piece with so much uncertainty.
You’re trying to move countries, you know.
Um, so for someone with a fixed move date, you know, a school year, a house sale, a lease ending, how should they be thinking about when their visa might be approved? I mean, I saw someone in the community in the move to spay master class was actually working with you um and they just got it in 4 weeks, you know, and they were expecting it to take longer.
So, you never know.
So, how can somebody manage this, I guess, given that they have these obligations potentially in Spain or back home? Specifically me in my in my initial 20inut consultations what I say always is to be prepared for the worst and anything that is quicker than that is a lottery.
So let’s say for example you want we are now in May so it’s it’s quite early in the year but you are planning to move let’s say January next year.
Looking backwards at the timeline, if we are thinking that the consulate has three months to approve, that means your if your visa needs to be approved in December, you should already submit that somewhere in late September, October and that means we have 6 months time to prepare and we should have have started in March.
So now we are in May.
Of course, their average timing to gather the documents can be maximum 3 months, maybe a few weeks, but then we need to think about the timing we will take to get the an appointment and then how long the consulate will will respond.
But then there’s a big shift that actually helps us because last year when your visa was approved, you actually only had 3 months to move.
So figuring out the timeline was much more difficult.
Now the visas are stamped for 365 days.
So the the biggest message I would like to share is that starting earlier than later will save you the stress about everything we just discussed about the struggles of appointments, the timeline of the consulate and their inconsistencies because you know you can get your visa earlier and you can still plan while you’re moving and it’s really phases as you say as you’ve said right working backwards.
there’s waiting to hear the approval, say 3 months, it could be a bit longer.
Before that, you’ve got say another 3 months because certain documents can’t be older than 3 months before you apply.
So that’s when you start gathering that documents, but you don’t want at the beginning of that 3 month gathering documents phase to be figuring out the documents.
You don’t want to eat up that time.
So then there’s say three months or even six months before that where you’re just working in a Google sheet figuring out what is everything I need, who is going to be my translator, you know, and I know obviously this is what you support people with, but you’ve got that sort of preliminary prep.
So once the 3 months pre-appoint triggers, you kind of you just know everything you got to do, right? And those documents.
So I think sort of trunching it down is really important.
Everything is about timeline.
Everything.
Before we go any further, I know you know applying for this visa can get really overwhelming.
So I have put together, you know, for everyone watching a free guide to help you apply successfully.
I’ve put it together with the help of Sabine and her team.
It’s called the non-lucrative visa insider guide.
It’s a cheat sheet covering the documents you’ll need, the apostil and translation steps, you know, key timing and application tips.
Sabine and the team at Bureaucracy process thousands of these applications a year have helped put it together.
And what I love about it is alongside the official requirements that are listed, it includes in this guide, you know, practical details sort of related or behind each document or each requirement that you won’t find on any official list that that come from the actual doing.
So, if you want to grab that free guide, you can scan the the QR code that’s popping up on the screen or you can grab it via the description uh down below.
Okay.
So, Savin, moving on.
There was a law update last year in May 2025, and I do want to touch on one key element of that, but we’re in 2026 now, so that’s kind of old news a little bit.
So, there haven’t been official big updates since then, but there have been some changes that you guys are seeing to how the non-lucrative visa, how it’s being enforced.
Let’s touch on retired people.
There’s no legal requirement to be retired to get the non-lucrative visa as you’ve said.
But given you can’t earn active income on it.
Retirees are a natural fit for this visa.
You know that said, consulates have been getting stricter on proving retirement status.
So what’s the current situation for people who are going to be retiring uh or retired in Spain on this visa? Well, in this case, uh the the typical retirement letter from the social security that shows that this pension is granted to you until which date when it starts and uh what is the amount? Of course, this letter is only valid if you are already receiving it or okay, we show the proof of not working with the pension letter and it starts next month, but we could not use the income that is coming from that.
And additionally of course if there is a resignation letter termination letter signed by the employer.
Now we also find people who are like hey I haven’t worked in the last year what do I show in this case writing an affidavit sworn an authorized letter that says that you understand that you cannot work and for now it is also working.
So as you said necessarily not being retired will disqualify you.
you just need to show that you don’t have the need to work.
And I think the challenge that I’ve seen people have is that in the past when you went to that application uh say a year or two ago, you know, a promise to retire in 2 months was uh was enough.
And it makes sense, right? You’re applying now, but you’re not moving for say 3 or 4 months and so or longer.
And you need that income.
So you plan to like apply, hopefully get approved.
You don’t even know if you’re going to get approved.
and then retire a month before you fly to Spain.
Right? But I see now that there is this requirement to have I don’t know if it’s consulate dependent but at the application date to have already retired as you say you show proof at that point a retirement letter uh or the fact that you’re receiving social security i.
e or a pension you have retired at the application date.
People say to me James but I need the additional 3 months of money that I would normally get.
So is this is what is this what we’re seeing that effectively people are having to show an application date that they’re retired.
They need to show that they have finished their active working before the appointment.
So maybe that’s a termination or resignation but that your last day of work was before the appointment.
Even if you yet don’t see your pension or it’s not yet granted or maybe you went for a private pension account that you had that’s fine until like as long as you can show that you have finished work it’s good.
I believe that is based on something that they have seen that people are not retiring.
They’re not finishing their work and they kept working even though they said they will.
So they had to put a stop on it.
That’s the only I’m not confirming it but just something that I am thinking that most likely happened.
No, that makes sense.
Okay.
So, it just is the reality.
And is that pretty much across the board now that requirement? Yes.
Yes, we have seen that at at first it started with one consulate and then usually it comes in waves.
So, if it starts at one, we automatically proactively start engaging with the same thing on every other aspect to avoid rejections or any extra documents.
H or extra timing on the visa approval.
I think you might have said recently to me uh let me know if I’m misquing that some consulates had called people’s workplaces to confirm if they had retired.
Is that the case? I mean, we don’t know if they have called, but they do require like information to make sure that the resignation letter is legit, that it’s not only a written up letter with a logo stamp on it, but there’s actually a contact information there saying that uh this is the department of that specific company and that if you need to, you can.
I don’t really think it happening.
It could happen, but I believe this is also to put a legitimate like more seriousness on the application.
Otherwise, they will be asking it notorized, which automatically makes it more stricter.
The threat of of of your HR being called.
So, what if someone isn’t retiring? You know, maybe they’re taking a sbatical or maybe they own their own business and they want to take a step back for a year or two, move with the family to Spain, have an experience or on their own.
How does the consulate treat that and what kind of proof would they need? Well, for example, if you are a freelancer or you have your own business and you just want to take a break, one thing you can do is you can with a notorized letter kind of leave the power or leave someone else as a manager with a written letter saying that you are just only going to gather the benefits or the dividends from that specific company, but someone else is going to take care of the business.
That’s one.
or you are selling the business or you are dissolving it.
That’s also enough proof.
There’s not just black and white.
Those are the main situations or main paperwork that we have seen that is most likely been the case for the person.
But of course, if there’s any other thing that we can show that you will not actively working on work on work on it, then that might work.
And I mean if you take on a risk, we always say if a person is very determined that they want to and we haven’t done something in past, we can try.
I mean there is a big big risk but we can try.
That doesn’t necessarily mean that that specific document won’t be approved.
Yeah.
I think and if obviously if you’re taking a sbatical you know letter from HR the whole you know that’s I I think Savine what I try to get across to people here is sometimes people say to me is this letter what they want or is this the kind of document and and you really touched on an important point uh there’s no official document list for some of this proof stuff.
What it is is what the consulate wants to know.
It wants to they’ve seen fraud where people have kept working and now that the non-lucr now that there’s the digital nomad visa you can work in Spain remotely.
If you’re going to do that they want you to go that route so you’re not on the non-lucrative visa cuz I knew you you used to be able to work in Spain on the non-lucrative visa.
They were very lax about it.
So there’s no official list of if you’re on a sobatical you got to show these three things.
It’s like how can you prove with a a a really legit paper trail that doesn’t leave any gaps or holes in your story that shows that you are going to not be working in Spain whatever your current situation and actually this brings up the next point I want to say the last one on these on these people is like I’ve heard or I’ve seen that the consulates can be harder on younger applicants because this is not as you’ve said a retirement visa but a lot of retirees do it because you can’t work In Spain, if you’re 31, they’re like, “Well, how do you earn your money? Like, how how can you make us believe that you can support yourself without working in Spain at 31?” If you’re 65, they get it, right? Cuz that’s kind of more normal.
So, what are the challenges for younger applicants and what what kind of proof do they need? As you said, it’s not the specific document, it’s the purpose of that document.
So, for younger people, the requirements are all the same.
So for example here a strong intent or strong affidavit letter showing that you have ended your work and then strong evidence of your plans for the future.
So if it’s a sbatical for in in your 30s you have worked a lot and you want to inverse in Spanish culture you need to explain that that and of course additionally show that you have enough financial means for it.
And this really is a little bit of a lottery.
We always advise like in your 20s in your 30s it’s possible to get rejected because consulates that person just considers that this is not legit and I mean there’s no way around it but we have had plenty of uh successful cases for young people even for students like I believe they were 20s something there were two two friends that I was actually so afraid of to to present like oh my god they will be rejected but no everything well went fine we We we we build a good case to make sure that the consulate sees it and it’s all good there.
So, it’s also how we reflect it that that matters.
Yeah, I like that you built the case, you framed it, you explained it and then you back it up with documentation and you know, Spanish bureaucrats love a stamp or a seal or a wet signature and a letter head and you know, getting into the mind of Spanish bureaucracy, which is obviously what where you guys live.
So far we’ve been discussing the practical kind of behindthe-scenes challenges rather than actual legal updates.
And last year as mentioned that in May 2025 some some updates did come in.
One of them being that the visa is now the initial period you can enter Spain is now 365 days.
But another key one was um specifically around the bank account information you have to provide when you apply.
There’s also some questions around bank certificates that are something that exist in Spain but not necessarily exist out outside Spain.
Uh so just walk us through what the banking information is that you have to provide uh as part of the financial proof.
Previously in 2025 is it was as simple as providing the bank statements, your tax returns showing that you have enough in your bank account and it was all good.
Now they are actually looking at your average bank balances of the previous year.
And the issue that we find is that sometimes our clients work with banks that don’t issue this or even banks that don’t have any customer service because they’re online banks.
So they’re like who do I even contact for this? So there’s always a way around that.
We have found out that writing a letter which shows all the information that the consulate wants to see when the account was open that is yours.
How much money you have now and we need to provide all the bank B all the bank statements of the previous year and of course we need to calculate the average bank statements.
Basically, they want to see that there’s no strange movement, that dur during the last year, no one sent you the money, so there’s no sponsorship.
They want to see that each individual applying and of course family units financial situation can be joint and mutual.
That’s fine.
But they want to see that the money is yours and you have built your own financial wallet, that there’s no one sponsoring or anything strange.
And I think what you touched on earlier is that sometimes these are are in response to fraud where it’s like I apply if I only had to show last three months of bank statements then maybe four months ago you know someone gave me a whole bunch of money so that I but it’s not really mine it doesn’t reflect that in an ongoing sense I can support myself in Spain.
Yeah, that you know I know it’s like you have to show your balance on the last day of the previous year and as you say that average of the statements it’s a very Spanish concept the salom medio we call it like your average balance over a period of time which was foreign to me when I came from New Zealand and I think is foreign to people but really what this is is is a calculation to show your average balance over a period say 12 months.
So as you can see they can see that you have a history of having the sufficient funds to support yourself.
Thus it makes sense you will also do that in the future right and that so the cell doio is just really that an average yes because they want to make sure that you you have enough finances to support yourself here of course they don’t want to accept maybe that there’s a burden for the country or that you cannot support yourself so they want to avoid this and I mean it makes sense and again this is also just the preparation many people have like a lot of money all over the world and different bank account.
So, it’s just how we reflect it and present it to the consulate to make sure that everything that they understand it because to be honest for the consulate it’s like this is too I don’t understand rejected too complicated so it all but balances out the the making things easier for them.
Keep it simple.
Uh, and look everyone watching, if you haven’t grabbed the non-lucrative visa insider guide yet, it really will help you have success in applying for this visa.
It’s really, really helpful.
Some great information there.
So, scan the QR code up on the screen and the link is in the description below.
And also, Sabine, people might be wondering, hey, I want this sounds great.
I would love to contact bureaucracy.
I’d love to contact Sabine and Tim and potentially uh, you know, get your help with this.
So, how can someone work with you? Not you personally, obviously.
It may not be, but the team.
Yes, the team bureaucracy Spain.
We are a team with a professional people who can help you.
The initial uh process would be ideally to register in our uh website which I believe we have a description below and then we can have a free consultation.
Basically it will take 2 minutes to register but during that registry you will already understand what is needed and that information also provides us the value to then go into the 20inut uh consultation to actually understand and go for the for the core needs of your specific situation and of course h we can discuss what is the timeline what what are the key points that you are interested in and and and figure it out.
So definitely there’s not there’s very few things that can’t be figured out.
I like that attitude.
There’s a link down in the description below that if you want to take advantage of that free 20-minute consultation to learn if this could be a fit for you and what the next steps might be, you can click on that.
Also, if you use that link, you’ll get a 10% discount that bureaucracy have kindly provided to the Spain reveal audience.
Uh only uh though, if you use that link, so make sure you click on that one down below.
So thank you uh very much Sabine.
It’s been great to have a chat.
I always enjoy it.
I appreciate it.
Yes, James.
Thank you very much for having me.
If you do want to go deeper onto, you know, the immigration aspect of a move to Spain, including other visa options, plus all the other, you know, key pieces of your move, the finance aspect, the location, where to live, healthcare, this video that’s appearing up there covers it all.
Uh, and I’ll see you over there in a moment.
