Tag Archives: Spanish residential visa

Ten Year Spanish Residency Renewal

5 Jun

I recently completed my 10 year Spanish residency renewal, which was fabulously easy, with apparent decreasing regulation the more years you have been residing in Spain. I will provide links to my initial non-lucrative Spanish residential visa, and the steps involved. I did my initial non-lucrative residential long-term visa in San Francisco (California), but keep in mind that when I did mine in 2013 Spanish embassies who processed them in different cities in the U.S. sometimes had different procedures, even differences between the embassies in San Francisco and Los Angeles.

I had always completed my initial, one year, two year, 2nd two year, and five year non-lucrative Spanish visa renewals myself, but for my 10 year, I decided to use a gestor or gestoria (administrator, manager, consultant who helps people to negotiate the particulars of the sometimes difficult to understand legal requirements) to assist with the process as it involved getting a Spanish criminal record check. In my area of the Costa Blanca, in Altea and Albir, I found a gestoria who confirmed I already had a long-term duration visa, but I still needed to renew it as my other 5 year visa (NIE) was expiring. I was given an appointment a few days later for which I was asked to bring my visa renewal application form, passport, NIE residency card, health insurance, tax paid, and padron (your registration in your town with your current address.) The gestoria simply asked me to send a photo of the aforementioned docs. (The links above to my prior blog posts about my Spanish residential visa and renewal applications had some expired links which I hoped I have removed.)

When I arrived, she had all the needed forms completed and I just needed to sign and pay what I felt was a reasonable fee for this quick, convenient process (133 Euros), done in less than 10 minutes. A few days later, I received notice from her office of my appointment to have my fingerprints taken at the police in Benidorm to complete the process, which was just a few days later. (I had heard of many complaints from people having difficulties securing appointments with the Benidorm police for the fingerprinting, but my gestoria apparently had magical or well-connected powers.) I just had to take a current regulation photo, which I was able to have done next door to the Benidorm police visa office, but you can get them in advance anywhere that does them for visas. After that fingerpriinting, I was told to return on a specific day four weeks later within a four hour time period, no appointment needed, to retrieve my new NIE card, which I did. Both police appointments were quick and efficient. Interestingly, with the 10 year visa, I am now allowed to work (not a chance), and there are other new perks, that didn´t apply to me.

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5 Year Spanish Residential (Non-Lucrative) Visa

10 May

celebrateHooray! I have just successfully completed the requirements for my Spanish residential/non-lucrative visa, which, as a U.S. citizen allows me to live in Spain full-time for the next five years.  This is my fourth renewal visa renewal, although many more trips were required to the various locales needed to fulfill all the necessary requirements.

This current visa renewal is for a period of five years, and was surprisingly simple compared to my earlier Spanish visa applications. The initial one, which I started while I was still living in California, was rather complicated to understand and complete all the requirements. First, there was the initial application in 2013 which I was required to submit at the Spanish Consulate in San Francisco, which was determined by where I was living. These are detailed in this blog post. Once arriving in Spain, there were additional steps to change the temporary visa into a permanent one. Ironically, by the time I received that visa, in November 2014, it was time to start the renewal process for my first renewal, which was for thankfully was for two years.

As many of the visa renewal requirements for the first two year visa were similar to the initial application, the process was easier, although still not without some challenges. The third renewal was also for two years, and again, increasingly easier, especially as I could go to nearby Benidorm to get my fingerprints done, as opposed to the long trek to Alicante.

I could not find the information on what documents were required to submit for the five year visa, so I assumed I would need to submit the same documents for my five year visa as I did for my prior visas. I diligently got a financial statement from my portfolio manager along with a statement of my projected social security benefits, which I had translated by a certified Spanish interpreter; a copy of my current medical insurance policy; documentation of my address being registered with City Hall (Ayuntamiento); copies of all pages of my passport and more.

When I went to submit my renewal request with the application form for the five year visa, documentation of having paid the application fee at a local bank, along with the other copious documentation, I was surprised to be informed that other than the application, documentation of paying the required fee, they only wanted the copies of my passport pages. Of course, they wanted to see my original passport to compare the copies, and my current Spanish Visa residency card (NIE).

A few weeks later, I received a letter indicating my application was approved. The letter, which was in Spanish provided the instructions to complete the Visa. While my Spanish is pretty good in social situations, official documents and other non-everyday Spanish are more challenging. I managed to decipher the requirements, setting up an appointment for my fingerprints to be taken in Benidorm, and instructions to print out another “TASA,” for which one has to pay another bank fee.

Feeling quite confident, I arrived as scheduled. But when I presented the papers , the officer kept asking for the  “resolución,” and I repeatedly replied in Spanish I didn’t understand. Eventually I understood he was asking for something that was sent to me in the mail, so I guessed it might have been the letter I received indicating my visa was approved and requiring the additional steps of setting an appointment and paying the TASA. He told me to return two days later with the required document. Still unsure of what document was required, the following day I went to the Oficina de Extranjeria, with all of my current application where I intended to inquire which document was the “resolución.” Fortunately, the screening officer at the front desk knew immediately what the needed document was and quickly identified it. Still unsure, I returned to the Benidorm Police Office at the designated time, although the officer did not arrive until an hour later. When I was eventually called to his desk, he indicated I had brought the proper missing document, and, after quick digital fingerprints, my visa was approved. I just had to return in 30 to 45 days to retrieve it.

UPDATE: So when I went back 31 days after it was approved, the police officer simply informed in Spanish that my visa had not arrived. He offered no dates as to when it would arrive. I arrived 46 days after the approval even though they said I could only pick it up between 30 and 45 days. Since it was a Monday, the 45 day window fell on a Sunday and I was fairly certain they would not have returned it. Fortunately, it was there. Whew! Interestingly, the renewal papers said I could work, even though my application was for a “non-lucrative” visa; don’t know why but maybe after five years of residency one is able to work in Spain. As a retiree who often worked 100 hours a week, I have no inclination to work.

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