Suggestions regarding proposed changes to golden visa rules as part of the Mais Habitação programme are being acknowledged by the government.

The Minister of Housing, Marina Gonçalves considers that, with the Government’s proposal under discussion in parliament, this is a phase “of listening to all the proposals “.

She points out, however, that more than 90% of golden visa investments are in real estate, which ends up having an indirect effect on the housing market, “because it obviously increases the cost of housing”, as stated in the report that measured the impact of these residence permits.

“With this, we do not want to discourage investment in the country, on the contrary, we already have a general visa policy, a general regime for granting visas that is also based on investment”, explains the minister, recalling that this is a discussion which is taking place all across Europe.

Regarding measures such as the one taken by Canada (which prevented the sale of houses to non-residents) and the impact that the attraction of digital nomads is also having on housing prices, Marina Gonçalves admits that this will have some indirect impact, but “has no dimension”.

“[The impact of digital nomads] does not have a dimension per se, seen individually, an indirect dimension in the price of housing”, she says, considering that, with this, it does not mean that “this debate should not be held in the future”.