What’s a Non- Lucrative Visa?

The first thing we must understand is the meaning of a Non-lucrative visa and what non-lucrative means. Non-Lucrative visa means non-profit, without engaging in or carrying out any work activity for a company, whether in person or electronically. This type of visa is exclusively for anyone who wants to go live abroad for a period of more than three months without needing work.

This visa is usually granted to those applicants who have decided to retire at an early age, those who have decided to take a gap year or simply to anyone who wants to go explore and enjoy the culture of the country without profit.

What are the requirements to obtain this type of visa? The first and one of the most important, and what the Spanish Government bases on approving this type of visa, is that the applicant is not going to carry out any work activity, and for this the Consulates usually request a letter from the applicant signed and endorsed by his employer confirming that the employee has decided to stop working for the time he plans to be abroad, either by taking a sabbatical year, or by resigning from his employer. Likewise, in the case of a retiree, the applicant must provide proof of social security that confirms that the applicant is retired and a letter signed before a notary, where the applicant agrees not to engage in any work or lucrative activity during the approval period of the visa and residence in the foreign country.

Once the Consulate is certain of this, the second thing would be to confirm that the applicant has sufficient financial means to be able to reside abroad, without the need to ask anything from the foreign government or an employer. For this it is necessary to verify that the applicant has a minimum or approximate amount of $48,000 USD in the bank account, plus another $7,000 for each additional dependent, that is, for a family of four it would be calculated $7000 x 4 + $48,000 = $76,000 USD. It is necessary to verify that the applicant has had this amount in their bank account for at least three months to a year depending on the Consulate where they request it. These two requirements mentioned above are the most important to qualify for this type of visa.

The next thing would be to have a Spanish medical insurance (not American) and it must meet the requirements for this type of visa. For this, we have a list of medical insurance that we offer to all our clients who apply for this type of visa.

Already having these three requirements, we can continue with the criminal record, this certificate must be obtained and confirm that no crime has been committed in the past five years, now if you have lived in different countries in the last five years you will have to obtain the criminal records from each country where you have resided in the last five years, plus apostilled and translated.

The requirements mentioned above are usually the most complicated and confusing for applicants to obtain, so on several occasions if the visa application is submitted incorrectly, the visa is usually denied, either due to the lack of documentation presented to the Consulate or for not qualifying because you have presented wrong documentation.

If the applicant is unsure of the documentation required for this type of visa, we generally suggest that they seek help from a professional before submitting their application to the Consulate. Many applicants submit their applications with missing documentation, which then results in a denial. It is crucial to understand that if the application is submitted incorrectly or incomplete, it will most likely result in a visa denial by not correcting the required documentation within the correction window.

written by our CEO Angeles