# non-lucrative residence visa



## slickrick (Aug 28, 2013)

Hi all, 

My girlfriend and I have been discussing the possibility of living in Spain at length lately. Ideally, we'd like a temporary residence visa, as we'll want to stay at least 6-12 months. My concern is over visa requirements and the implications of our working situation. Hoping that someone here can shed some light. 

We're Canadian, and self-employed. The nature of our work, being all virtual & online, allows us to service our client-base (all Canadian companies) from anywhere. We are not looking to work with anyone in Spain, only to continue the work that we do for our Canadian clients. 

What I'm trying to figure out is whether or not this working situation would raise any eyebrows when attempting to get a visa. As we aren't working for a Spanish company, we wouldn't need a work visa, so I assume the non-lucrative residence visa is what we're after. We can prove sufficient monthly income to sustain ourselves in Spain, but our source of income is my Canadian business.

Thanks in advance!


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## xabiaxica (Jun 23, 2009)

slickrick said:


> Hi all,
> 
> My girlfriend and I have been discussing the possibility of living in Spain at length lately. Ideally, we'd like a temporary residence visa, as we'll want to stay at least 6-12 months. My concern is over visa requirements and the implications of our working situation. Hoping that someone here can shed some light.
> 
> ...


as I understand it, if *you *are physically in Spain when you are working - as you say you would be - then you need a visa which allows you to work in Spain, & you'd be expected to pay tax & self-employment social security insurance (autónomo payments) - it doesn't matter where the customers are

which would mean that a non-lucrative visa wouldn't be appropriate

that said, the only place you can get a definitive answer would be the Spanish Consulate at which you would be applying for a visa, so the best thing would be to contact them

if that visa isn't available to you, they might have other suggestions


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## Nononymous (Jul 12, 2011)

The above is pretty much the situation for any non-EU national living in an EU country and telecommuting to an offshore job.

To be completely legal, you'd need to apply for permission to stay on the basis of consulting income, square away taxes and social insurance and, I imagine, deal with all manner of bureaucratic hurdles.

The simpler and more-or-less legal option is to come for shorter tourist visits (90 days out of 180, so 3 months in, 3 months out) for which you don't need a visa (but for which you would need your own health insurance) and work remotely. Some view this as cheating, some view this as perfectly acceptable; at the very least, it's undetectable. 90-in-180 is actually a Schengen area rule so you could do the 3 months out of Spain in the UK or Eastern Europe, but not France or Portugal for example. 

The much-less-legal option is to apply for the non-lucrative visa on the basis of demonstrated savings and some vaguely fictional plan to learn Spanish or paint watercolours, then work remotely. Probably fine if you keep it to a year. Some will view this as a great crime; it's probably still undetectable. 

Definitive answers would come from the consulate, as they'd be granting the visa.


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## AllHeart (Nov 22, 2013)

Hi Slickrick. Great to see a fellow Canadian here. We hail from the same area. Welcome to the forum. 

Xabiachica is right, that if you're living in Spain, you have to claim your income as Spanish income. I've worked from home as a self-employed medical transcriptionist. When SARS hit Toronto, I lost my medical transcription hospital contracts due to closures, and I worked for the States for a couple of years - but my income was Canadian. The same when I recently worked for Australia. Similarly, when I looked into moving to Spain and working for other countries, it was the same - the income is considered Spanish. I don't know the taxes for all countries, but there are some examples for you.

You're lucky to be living in Toronto, because the Spanish Consulate is just at Yonge & Bloor. As Xabiachica said, they're the ones to contact for a visa. Here is info from their website:

Location, email, fax and phone: Location and Contact Info

Hours:
Office Hours

Just a tip from my own experience: They are more able to help you if you speak Spanish, and are very grateful when you speak Spanish.

Good luck with that! 

One question for you: So here you are living the dream of a person working on the Internet, so you can live practically anywhere in the world. Why would you and your girlfriend choose Spain?


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## AllHeart (Nov 22, 2013)

Hey again Slickrick. I just found some fantastic info for you on the consulate's website re working in Spain:

Pages - Working in Spain


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## sagapo (Dec 9, 2008)

A neighbor of mine has gone to Spain twice, once for six months and once for seven months without obtaining a visa. The overstay was illegal but in her case there were no consequences and she had fantastic times. It's a thought!


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## xabiaxica (Jun 23, 2009)

sagapo said:


> A neighbor of mine has gone to Spain twice, once for six months and once for seven months without obtaining a visa. The overstay was illegal but in her case there were no consequences and she had fantastic times. It's a thought!


she's lucky she didn't get caught - if she had been, she ran the possibility of a very long, or even lifetime, ban


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## adi700 (Apr 26, 2018)

slickrick said:


> As we aren't working for a Spanish company, we wouldn't need a work visa, so I assume the non-lucrative residence visa is what we're after.


I also got a non-lucrative visa. I do online work and all my clients are in the US. What did you find out eventually regarding whether you can work online using a non-lucrative visa? I would be very grateful to hear.


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