Latvia

It is on the brink. On 11 June 2026 the Saeima passed a new Immigration Law (65-17), scrapping the real estate and subordinated-capital routes. On 19 June 2026 President Rinkevics refused to promulgate it. He returned it for reconsideration, citing source-of-funds and money-laundering safeguards. The re-vote falls to the autumn 2026 session, with intended commencement on 1 January 2027. The repeal has already passed. It is not speculative. Treat the window as now to end-2026. File now if you want this route, and expect grandfathering rather than survival.

On a EUR 250,000 purchase, budget for the property price plus a 5% state budget payment (EUR 12,500), plus roughly EUR 10,000-20,000 in legal, notarial and agency costs. The property must be one functionally connected unit in Riga, Jurmala or a listed municipality with a cadastral value of at least EUR 80,000, or up to two properties elsewhere at EUR 40,000 cadastral value each. Keep in mind that Latvian residential property outside central Riga is thin and slow to sell, so you may lose more on the round trip than the permit is worth. A Cabinet draft has floated raising the threshold to EUR 350,000, though PMLP still publishes EUR 250,000.

In practice, no. The permit itself needs no physical presence. Permanent residence is a different matter. It requires you to be physically resident in four of the five years, and any year with more than 183 days' absence does not count. You will also need A2 level Latvian. Citizenship requires five further years of PR on top of that, roughly ten years in total, plus exams in Latvian language, history and the Constitution. The very feature that makes the permit attractive, its lack of a presence requirement, is what makes the path to PR and citizenship unreachable for most people. Marketing that presents EUR 250,000 of Latvian property as a route to EU citizenship is misleading.

Only from a whitelist. Latvia permits dual citizenship with EU, EFTA and NATO states, plus Australia, Brazil and New Zealand, so most non-Western clients would have to renounce their existing nationality to naturalise. Combined with the unreachable presence requirements, this is a major reason the honest advice on the golden visa is usually to skip it. Russian and Belarusian citizens are barred outright. First-time TRPs to them have been suspended since 11 April 2022, and amendments due in June 2026 specifically exclude them from investment-based permits.

The share-capital route is the only investment route that survives the new Immigration Law. Once it commences, permits drop from five years to two. At EUR 50,000 of equity in a small Latvian company, plus a EUR 10,000 state payment, the effective entry cost is EUR 60,000, making it the cheapest headline investment-residence figure in the EU. But PMLP scrutinises whether the company genuinely operates, and a shelf company fails at renewal. For a founder who will actually move, the startup visa is cheaper still. There is no capital threshold, just a subsistence proof of EUR 500 a month and an accepted three-year business plan. Its residence time also genuinely accrues toward permanent residence.

Latvia's real structural advantage sits in corporate tax, not personal tax. Retained and reinvested earnings are taxed at 0%, with 20% due only when profits are distributed. On the personal side, capital gains are now taxed at 25.5%. The old 20% rate was abolished from 1 January 2025, surviving only, on a transitional basis, for disposals initiated before 31 December 2024. The top income rate reaches an effective 36%, with a 3% surcharge above EUR 200,000. There is no wealth tax and no inheritance tax, and gifts are exempt between spouses and relatives to the third degree. Latvia is a full CRS participant, and there is no personal exit tax.

Its status is genuinely unclear, and you should not rely on it without direct PMLP confirmation. PMLP still publishes the page, which describes EUR 250,000 in interest-free special-purpose bonds plus a EUR 38,000 state payment, but the page has not been updated since 22 April 2022. Meanwhile, multiple secondary sources and a Cabinet draft state that the securities route was already eliminated before the 2026 reform. Even if it were still operable, EUR 38,000 in fees on zero-interest bonds amounts to a guaranteed 15% loss before you count opportunity cost, and take-up was negligible. This is exactly the kind of stale official page that lets intermediaries sell a product that may no longer exist.

You cannot, because it is not law yet. The new Immigration Law passed on 11 June 2026 contains a EUR 150,000 route into a state-created alternative investment fund, plus a EUR 10,000 state payment. But the President returned the law unpromulgated on 19 June 2026. Intended commencement is 1 January 2027, and the infrastructure for the state fund manager does not yet exist. Any advisor offering to pre-register you is selling nothing. The President's stated objection was specifically about source-of-funds checks on this route, so the final shape may differ materially. Russian and Belarusian citizens are expressly excluded.