# Obtaining residency



## High flyer (Jun 22, 2018)

We already own a property in spain(Casares Playa) have decided to now sell up in the U.K. and move permanently. We will then sell the Casares property and buy a townhouse. Would you nice people take us through the actual process involved please. We know this subject has been discussed a lot on the forum, but not case specific.
1) Health cover, we are both of retirement age my wife has a pacemaker, S1 and still use the NHS for this one issue, obtaining cover in Spain as required?
2) our pensions paid into our U.K. bank, how would taxation work?
3) What basically would be the very first step and what we would need to take care of to ensure it is done properly and legally.
We have NIE certificates , Spanish bank account and as said previously own a property in Spain. Property to sell in the U.K.
Sorry a bit lengthy, thank you all.


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## Juan C (Sep 4, 2017)

Check out your tax situation. You may find you will be liable for CGT in Spain when you sell the U.K. property and your existing property in spain. It can be avoided but you need to research your specific situation and maybe take advice. 

At present (pre Brexit) to register on the EU Citizens Register you need an S1 from DWP, then register on the system here. That means DWP will pay spain around 4,700 € per year for your ‘free health cover’ in spain 

Your wife will then be attended in
Spain for pacemaker and everything else. You cannot choose to split it between spain and U.K. However if when visiting U.K. either of you need medications or a visit to doctor or Hospital WHILE YOU ARE VISITING that would be no problem but you cannot go to U.K. specifically for treatment etc 

Your OAP will be sufficient income. The easiest way to prove that is to have DWP pay the pensions direct to you spanish bank. That will save having to make spanish translations The exchange rate you will get will be the best possible. No other MO can beat it. You should also then get free banking with your pension being paid direct. If not consider changing your bank 

You then need to make an appointment on line, complete an EX18 application form and the payment form

When you attend, take the two forms, a copy of the appointment and your original and a copy of your passport 


Pretty straightforward 

This should help 

TO MAKE AN APPOINTMENT WITH THE POLICE FOR NIE, E.U. Citizen registration, etc.

As you go through you will find links to the application forms and the payment, at any bank, form 

.• GO TO https://sede.administracionespublicas.gob.es/icpplus/ 

• PROVINCES AVAILABLE: CHOOSE the province where your are living/ staying 

• SECTIONS AVAILABLE IN PROVINCE: OPEN PAGE AND SELECT SECTION REQUIRED

e.g. “policía certificado de residente o no residente” (that includes NIE application) 


• ENTER THE DETAILS OF APPLICANT. if you have an NIE show that, if not then show your passport number 

• CHOOSE NATIONAL POLICE STATION FOR APPOINTMENT: The one that covers the area where you are living - staying 

• CHOOSE APPOINTMENT, AND THEN CONFIRM

• You must PRINT A COPY OF THE APPOINTMENT, And take it with you to the police station

You can find info here in english about completing the EX15. The EX requires more or less the same

http://www.exteriores.gob.es/Consul...E 2018 - TRANSLATED NIE FORM 2018 - GUIDE.pdf


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## High flyer (Jun 22, 2018)

Juan C said:


> Check out your tax situation. You may find you will be liable for CGT in Spain when you sell the U.K. property and your existing property in spain. It can be avoided but you need to research your specific situation and maybe take advice.
> 
> At present (pre Brexit) to register on the EU Citizens Register you need an S1 from DWP, then register on the system here. That means DWP will pay spain around 4,700 € per year for your ‘free health cover’ in spain
> 
> ...


Thank you very much for all the helpful and informative information/ links. I will study all this carefully. Again thank you for the reply.


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## Monkey104 (Aug 24, 2014)

My wife and I have just obtained our residency status this morning.
We used a gestor as our Spanish is not up to the level required should any of our paperwork be wrong or missing.
We were in and out of the police station within half hour and excitedly clutching our green cards in our hands.
That for me was the biggest obstacle out of the way, just got to crack on with the language now.


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## Juan C (Sep 4, 2017)

Monkey, 

Glad to hear it did not take any longer with the gestor there than it takes without one. 

It just cost you more than, the less than 11 euros, DIY it would have cost.


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## Monkey104 (Aug 24, 2014)

Juan C said:


> Monkey,
> 
> Glad to hear it did not take any longer with the gestor there than it takes without one.
> 
> It just cost you more than, the less than 11 euros, DIY it would have cost.


Where we spent a week trying to get an appointment without success our gestor obtained one straight away, arranged all our paperwork and attended the police station with us as translator.
Thanks anyway.


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## Alcalaina (Aug 6, 2010)

Monkey104 said:


> Where we spent a week trying to get an appointment without success our gestor obtained one straight away, arranged all our paperwork and attended the police station with us as translator.
> Thanks anyway.


A good gestor is worth her/his weight in gold. Takes all the stress out of things!


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## Simply Simon (Jan 18, 2019)

I think it depends where you apply. We could not get an appointment in Denia, the system has as our lawyer said 'imploded', so she tried every day for a cancellation and we eventually got one in Torrivieja. We arrived at the appointed time of 9.00 and the police officer refused to accept the documents we had bought with us as they needed to be translated by an 'official' translator, not our lawyer, so we had to find one - that would have been tough if we had not had our Spanish lawyer with us. They also argued with her for ages that our Padron certificate was an application not an actual certificate, she smiled nicely and asked why anyone would just apply for patron and eventually the boss policeman relented, the desk lady was miffed and said she wouldn't have accepted it. They also refused to accept the certified statement we had from our bank showing 6 months of deposits so we had to go to the local branch and get certified statements of all the transactions.

We eventually got the documents 'officially' translated - Marriage certificate, UK bank statements, my wife's pension papers and returned to the police station to be told that they stopped accepting documents at 12:00, another tense negotiation with our lawyer and eventually we were given our cards! There is no way we would have been able to do this without her and every penny we paid was worth it, a 5 hour round trip to Torrivieja, not a scooby what we should do and very little chance of getting a quick appointment, it makes me shudder thinking about it.

Then, when we went to the Social Security office it turned out that the DWP in the UK had marked my dependents box on the S1 as a dependent of the insured, not a pensioner so we had to get them to send another form!

I would suggest that anybody going for residency or registering for health, checks everything 27 times, any certificates have to be less than 3 month old (we had to get a new marriage certificate sent from the UK, that cost £50!). Maybe you can go it alone, but if things go wobbly they will go very wobbly!


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## yozzi (Aug 30, 2012)

Hi everyone, I've been reading this thread with great interest as I'm a UK expat living in South Africa and it's always been a goal of mine to move and retire to Spain and we are coming to Spain in mid Sept for 6 weeks to travel down the eastern coast to get an idea of where we would want to eventually reside. I would be looking at somewhere with a good all year round climate so I'm sure the south east would be a preferable destination but open to any suggestions that others may have on that.

My big question is would there be anything I can do while I'm here in Sept/Oct with regards to putting the wheels in motion for obtaining Spanish residency? I don't have an address in Spain as yet or a bank account but we would be looking at moving to Spain in the next two years so if there is anything I could do when here and given that Brexit will maybe happen either by the end of Oct or very soon thereafter it makes sense to try and get things going while I'm here. My partner has a SA passport while I have a British/EU passport.

Any help in this regard would be much appreciated.


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## Juan C (Sep 4, 2017)

Yozzi 

If Brexit happens you may find it a lot more difficult than it is now to move to Spain. 

A no deal Brexit would probably mean Brits will have the status as say South Africans,


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## yozzi (Aug 30, 2012)

Juan C said:


> Yozzi
> 
> If Brexit happens you may find it a lot more difficult than it is now to move to Spain.
> 
> A no deal Brexit would probably mean Brits will have the status as say South Africans,


Juan C, that's my worry so if there is anything I can do before Oct 31st while we are in Spain needs to be investigated could I register for residency while I'm here?


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## Juan C (Sep 4, 2017)

Yozzi, 

The only thing you could do is move to Spain before 31st October. That way you would be in with a chance of being allowed to stay. You cannot register to do so etc.

The problem with no deal Brexit is that everything which has been `promised´ with regard to special treatment for resident brits relies on a deal. No deal , then anything could happen


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## xabiaxica (Jun 23, 2009)

yozzi said:


> Hi everyone, I've been reading this thread with great interest as I'm a UK expat living in South Africa and it's always been a goal of mine to move and retire to Spain and we are coming to Spain in mid Sept for 6 weeks to travel down the eastern coast to get an idea of where we would want to eventually reside. I would be looking at somewhere with a good all year round climate so I'm sure the south east would be a preferable destination but open to any suggestions that others may have on that.
> 
> My big question is would there be anything I can do while I'm here in Sept/Oct with regards to putting the wheels in motion for obtaining Spanish residency? I don't have an address in Spain as yet or a bank account but we would be looking at moving to Spain in the next two years so if there is anything I could do when here and given that Brexit will maybe happen either by the end of Oct or very soon thereafter it makes sense to try and get things going while I'm here. My partner has a SA passport while I have a British/EU passport.
> 
> Any help in this regard would be much appreciated.


To register as an EU resident you have to BE resident. In other words you need to be here or plan to be here 90+ consecutive days when you register - not at some time in the future.


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## Simply Simon (Jan 18, 2019)

yozzi said:


> Juan C, that's my worry so if there is anything I can do before Oct 31st while we are in Spain needs to be investigated could I register for residency while I'm here?


Again, I think it may depend on where you apply, but your experience was that you needed to either own a property or have a long term rental contract to apply for residency. We needed to take our Escritura (deeds), an up to data Padron certificate - which we needed the Escritura to get registered at the town hall, our NIEs and everything else you could think of. 

We had opened a bank account 6 months before we moved here, but the police would not accept just payments in, we had to show bank statements proving that we actually lived here and were spending locally. 

I could be wrong but it seems that the police are being very picky and applying all the rules (and their own particular 'rules') when granting residency, they are making it tougher than it seems it was in the past. They have had a lot of Brits applying and they are probably getting a bit umpty about all the work.


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## Juan C (Sep 4, 2017)

Simon. You seem have a tendency to confusion. 

From other posts, you have explained that your `professional´ adviser is not on the ball. (You said following their vice, you went to an appointment and the paperwork you took was incorrect). 

It would appear that maybe you were quoting your adviser, when you described your experience in your post.

Firstly, although there `might very minor differences´ between one police documentation office and another, the rules which they must work by are those of the Ministry of the Interior, and those same rules apply everywhere in Spain. Thus if you are asked for something other than as listed in the Rules, explain to the officer that they are wrong !

The rules for application for EU Citizen Registration for an EU national are:--

Sufficient income, at present that is no more than 400 euros p.m. for a single person, 640 p.m. for a couple. ( If one has a job or an official job offer that is sufficient). Owning a `property in Spain or savings of at least one year's required income, are also sufficient.

Full medical cover with no co-payments ( If one has a job or an official job offer that is sufficient)

The EX18 application form,

The 790 code 012, that´s the payment form

Original and a copy of valid passport.


PS This might help those who need to make an appointment:-


TO MAKE AN APPOINTMENT WITH THE POLICE FOR :- NIE, E.U. Citizen registration, etc.

(As you go through you will find links to the application forms and the payment, at any bank, form) 

.• GO TO https://sede.administracionespublicas.gob.es/icpplus/ 

• PROVINCES AVAILABLE: CHOOSE the province where you are living/ staying 

• SECTIONS AVAILABLE IN PROVINCE: OPEN PAGE AND SELECT SECTION REQUIRED

e.g. “policía certificado de residente o no residente” (that includes NIE aplicación) 


• ENTER THE DETAILS OF APPLICANT. if you have an NIE show that, if not then show your passport number 

• CHOOSE NATIONAL POLICE STATION FOR APPOINTMENT: The one that covers the area where you are living - staying 

• CHOOSE APPOINTMENT, AND THEN CONFIRM

• You must PRINT A COPY OF THE APPOINTMENT, And take it with you to the police station


You can find info here in English about completing the EX15


http://www.exteriores.gob.es/Consul...E 2018 - TRANSLATED NIE FORM 2018 - GUIDE.pdf


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## Simply Simon (Jan 18, 2019)

Juan C said:


> Simon. You seem have a tendency to confusion.
> 
> From other posts, you have explained that your `professional´ adviser is not on the ball. (You said following their vice, you went to an appointment and the paperwork you took was incorrect).
> 
> ...


Woah! No confusion, I am just telling you what actually happened in real life. Our paper work was correct but the individual police station/officer chose to apply the rules as he saw fit. Good lucky to anyone trying to argue what the rules are with the police! We had all the boxes ticked, a paid for house, more than adequate money in our Spanish account, more than enough income. Of course we had researched the places you quote and our lawyer has a lot of experience in dealing with the feds and she is totally 'on the ball' ta very much.

Also good luck to anyone trying to get an appointment (in my area) at the moment - there are none.

OK, you have quoted the 'rules' but as you and everyone else in Spain knows, the rules are fluid. I have only posted, without any 'confusion' what actually, factually and in real-life happened to us, it didn't happen to you and it might not happen to anyone else, they might be lucky and go to a police station where the rules are applied as per your post.


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## Love Karma (Oct 10, 2018)

Juan C said:


> Simon.
> 
> Firstly, although there `might very minor differences´ between one police documentation office and another, the rules which they must work by are those of the Ministry of the Interior, and those same rules apply everywhere in Spain. Thus if you are asked for something other than as listed in the Rules, explain to the officer that they are wrong !
> 
> ...


Total nonsense "very minor differences" my foot......they vary massively from office to office and that is generally accepted as the way it is and often quoted here as such.


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## baldilocks (Mar 7, 2010)

It might cost you a few € but getting a gestor to assist will make all the difference.


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## High flyer (Jun 22, 2018)

baldilocks said:


> It might cost you a few € but getting a gestor to assist will make all the difference.


Couldn’t agree more, especially if you don’t speak much Spanish, my wife has a fairly decent grasp mine not so! Our gestor has been invaluable and very reasonable fees.


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## Juan C (Sep 4, 2017)

baldilocks said:


> It might cost you a few € but getting a gestor to assist will make all the difference.


Simon had a gestor but he reported he had lots of problems. 

I seem to remember one problem was that the info he was supplying had not been translated by a traductor judicial. That of course is a requirement for any document which one is relying on in spain when making an application, not as Simon seems to think that it was the police being difficult


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## Simply Simon (Jan 18, 2019)

Juan C said:


> Simon had a gestor but he reported he had lots of problems.
> 
> I seem to remember one problem was that the info he was supplying had not been translated by a traductor judicial. That of course is a requirement for any document which one is relying on in spain when making an application, not as Simon seems to think that it was the police being difficult


Yep, we had problems that were resolved by our lawyer while were at the Police station, without her we would have been up the creek without a doodah. The police WERE being difficult as our lawyer has processed hundreds of residency applications and has never experienced this level of scrutiny. I also didn't expect this level of scrutiny when like I said I was just explaining what happened to me in case it might be useful to others, you seem unhappy with my lawyer, I'm not.


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