# Citizenship requirements



## Rvkrules (Oct 29, 2021)

Hi all!

I am please to say that next year i will be eligible to apply for citizenship (married to a local and living here for a year) in spain. We live in Segovia, Spain. Anyone have experiences and information they can share?

Particularly i am looking for:

links to where i can find the requirements needed
how was the process and advice
how long did it take after you submitted the application
While you are undergoing application can you leave the country? 
What about move to a different country ( i assume not, but curious on the rules)


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## tebo53 (Sep 18, 2014)

I'm probably wrong but I thought that you had to live here for 10 years before you can apply for citizenship. Do you mean residency? 

Steve


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## timwip (Feb 27, 2017)

You are correct, there is only a one year residency requirement for citizenship if you are married to a Spaniard. I am also married to a Spaniard and have been here for about three years but have not applied for citizenship. Proceed with caution especially if you are from the United States. The only downside of not being a Spanish citizen is that you can not vote in elections. If you are an American and become a Spanish citizen, you can lose your United States citizenship. Be careful.


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## kalohi (May 6, 2012)

timwip said:


> You are correct, there is only a one year residency requirement for citizenship if you are married to a Spaniard. I am also married to a Spaniard and have been here for about three years but have not applied for citizenship. Proceed with caution especially if you are from the United States. The only downside of not being a Spanish citizen is that you can not vote in elections. If you are an American and become a Spanish citizen, you can lose your United States citizenship. Be careful.


I wouldn't agree that the only downside to not being a Spanish citizen is not being able to vote. The other HUGE downside is how ridiculously difficult it is to renew a TIE. It's gotten to the point where it's sometimes impossible because there are simply no appointments being opened up at extranjeria. Even once you get an appointment the renewal can take months. And without an up-to-date and valid TIE we can't travel outside of Spain (not without getting a regreso, which is another nightmare), we can't carry out any legal transactions, and we risk our bank accounts being frozen because banks require proof of an up-to-date TIE. God forbid your card gets lost or stolen! It recently happened to me when my wallet was stolen and I had to wait NINE months to get a replacement. All I could think during those 9 months was how easy it would be to replace a DNI. 

Once this pandemic is over and life gets back to normal the first thing on my to-do list will be to get Spanish citizenship! 

BTW, it's no easy thing to lose your US citizenship. The US doesn't want to let us go. Among other things, Uncle Sam requires us to pay a hefty exit tax. So just because a Spanish judge says you're no longer American doesn't make it so.


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## Alcalaina (Aug 6, 2010)

I haven’t done it but my husband and several friends have. If you do it yourself it can take a few years, but there are law firms who can do it in a year or so if you can afford to shell out a few hundred euros. In the meantime you can leave the country under the terms of your current residency status.


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## Overandout (Nov 10, 2012)

I have investigated this and have started a thread about my own application, which then went off at a tangent as I procrastinated, changed priorities and the whole thing got Covidised.... but the links you are looking for should be in there:









My application for citizenship


So I've been umming and ahhing about this for a while now, having now fulfilled the conditions required to apply, but not really having had the need / incentive to go ahead. But the UK's prime minister has now made a bigger idiot of himself and all British citizens than any British drunkard has...




www.expatforum.com





I will be taking this up again in the new year.

I too have lived for more than 1 year in Spain as the spouse of a Spaniard so have the same rights but to try to answer your questions as far as I can:

I haven't really started the process so can't comment on it in terms of ease / difficulty
Yes you can travel out of Spain while it is in process
No you cannot change your country of residency (if you do you cannot then start the application again until you have been once again resident one year.
I have a friend that applied about 2 years ago and he still has not had any response, you should allow for about 4 years to complete it (but you can use a legal right to force them to answer earlier if you want to pay a lawyer).


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## Nononymous (Jul 12, 2011)

timwip said:


> If you are an American and become a Spanish citizen, you can lose your United States citizenship. Be careful.


It's a bit more complicated than that. To lose US citizenship you need to either (i) go to a US consulate, pay $2350 and swear an oath that you renounce, or (ii) acquire another citizenship _with the intention of giving up your US citizenship_, then go to a US consulate, pay $2350 and document your prior relinquishment on the basis of naturalization. Same price either way, and renouncing is less paperwork. Otherwise you're still a US citizen as far as the US government is concerned.

Whether Spain allows one to keep US citizenship, or demands proof that you've given it up as part of the naturalization process (as the Germans do) is a subject I know nothing about, but I gather this is basically fudged - Spain simply "says" you're not a US citizen as far as it's concerned, but of course you remain one unless you take steps to get rid of it.

One virtue of renouncing (or documenting relinquishment) is that you receive a piece of paper that certifies loss of US nationality. This is very useful if you are dealing with banks that subject you to FATCA reporting or restrict the services offered. If you were to present evidence of recently acquired Spanish citizenship and said "this means I'm no longer a US citizen" they may or may not believe you. But there's no arguing with the CLN document, for which one must pay the $2350 fee.



kalohi said:


> BTW, it's no easy thing to lose your US citizenship. The US doesn't want to let us go. Among other things, Uncle Sam requires us to pay a hefty exit tax.


There is actually no requirement that someone renouncing US citizenship be in prior tax compliance, or file the paperwork to exit the US tax system and potentially pay a punitive exit tax. If one wishes, one may simply renounce. There's a nasty fee, of course, but the tax business is entirely optional. If someone had long ago stopped filing US tax returns they don't need to start again if they wish to rid themselves of US citizenship, but if one has US assets, income sources or other financial ties, then it's not so simple.


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