Cyprus Permanent Residence by Investment

The threshold is EUR 300,000, but that figure is only half the financial test — the other half is income, and missing it means misreading the route. Paragraph 2.1 offers a choice of one of four investment categories, all at the same EUR 300,000:

Paragraph 2.2 adds the second tier: in addition to the investment, the applicant must prove a secure annual income at the following minimum levels, in euro:

For category (A) that income must come from abroad and can be proved only through a tax return from the country of tax residence; for categories (B), (C) and (D) part or all of it may come from activities within the Republic.

Three conditions on the money itself travel alongside and cannot be skipped: the funds must be proved to have been transferred to Cyprus from abroad, must come from the account of the applicant or of their spouse where the spouse is included in the application, and must be paid into the seller account at a Cyprus financial institution.

For categories (A) and (B), evidence must be filed on submission that the money is not the result of domestic borrowing.

And one clause locks the whole thing: if the permit holder alienates the investment without immediately replacing it with another of equal or greater value that also meets these conditions, the permit is cancelled under Regulation 6.

Two dates sit on the document: the text calls itself the 4th Revision of May 2023 and states it entered into force on 02/05/2023, while the page carrying it is dated 29 December 2025.

The outcome is an unlimited residence right, not citizenship, and the way the authority separates the two is the part that most repays close reading.

The procedural page states it plainly: the residence right conferred by this permit is of unlimited validity, for the holder and for their adult dependants.

But the residence card — the object carrying that right — has an expiry date of ten years from issuance and must be replaced on expiry; the card issued to underage dependants is valid until they turn 18.

The right does not expire, the card does, and conflating the two is the most common misreading of this route.

On its legal name, this is an Immigration Permit granted under Regulation 6(2) of the Aliens and Immigration Regulations: the text records that the Minister of Interior, having notified the Council of Ministers, decided to issue an Immigration Permit to third country applicants in cases of investment meeting this policy.

The route carries an employment restriction alongside the residence right, in paragraph 3.3: the applicant and their spouse must confirm they do not intend to undertake any form of employment in the Republic, except as Directors in the company they have chosen to invest in under this policy.

Paragraph 3.4 opens one further door: where the investment is not in share capital, the applicant and spouse may still be shareholders in companies registered in Cyprus, and dividend income from such companies is not treated as an obstacle to obtaining the permit; in those companies they may also hold the position of an unpaid Director.

The authority does publish a time, which is rare in this table — most other routes set deadlines only for the applicant.

Paragraph 8 of the policy: if all criteria are met and there are no concerns about criminal record, public order or public security, the application is presented to the Deputy Minister of Migration and International Protection for examination and decision.

The estimated examination period is approximately two months, counted from the submission date of the completed application.

Two words repay attention, estimated and completed: this is a projection rather than a legal duty, and the clock starts only once the file is whole.

The procedural page nails down that second point: applications not accompanied by all the required documents will not be accepted for consideration.

The route as a whole runs under an expedited procedure handled by the Migration Department itself, then submitted to the Deputy Minister through the Permanent Secretary of the Deputy Ministry.

Three further dates sit outside the processing window but on the same timeline. First, applications are filed in person at the Department, or through an authorised representative, after arranging an appointment.

Second, while the application is under examination, any change in the applicant data must be notified to the Department immediately.

Third, approval starts a year-long clock of its own: the permit ceases to be valid if the holder and their dependants fail to acquire residence in Cyprus within one year of the approval, where they are residing outside Cyprus.

There is no minimum number of days of presence, but there are two ways to lose the right and a monitoring mechanism running for the life of the permit — and the first of those is the one buyers most often do not know.

The procedural page sets out two routes to loss of the permanent residence right: the permit ceases to be valid if the holder and their dependants acquire permanent residence abroad, or are absent from Cyprus for a period of two years.

The first limb deserves more attention than the second because it is not measured in time at all: becoming a permanent resident of another country is enough, even for someone who returns to Cyprus regularly.

Before either of those sits an earlier gate: where the holder and their dependants are residing outside Cyprus, the permit ceases to be valid unless they acquire residence in Cyprus within one year of the approval of the application.

On accommodation, paragraph 3.5 asks for evidence rather than intention. An applicant investing under categories (B), (C) or (D) must provide evidence of accommodation in the Republic, by title of ownership, contract of sale with proof of payment, or a rental agreement.

An applicant under category (A) whose investment property has too few bedrooms for the dependent family members must indicate another property or properties to serve as their residence.

The monitoring mechanism in paragraph 10 is the long-term part, and it has just been relaxed — the clarifications published with the policy must be read alongside paragraph 10, not instead of it.

As originally drafted, paragraph 10 required annual evidence of maintaining the investment, of maintaining the required income, and of holding health insurance where no longer covered by the national scheme, plus an annual clean criminal record certificate for the applicant and adult family members.

The clarifications abolish the requirement for annual proof of income, and move the criminal record certificate from annual to once every three years. What remains still has teeth: failure to prove it results in cancellation of the permit of that person and of their family members, under Regulation 6.

The scope of dependants here runs in three tiers at three different prices, and in the third tier the money multiplies rather than adds. Amounts are in euro:

Paragraph 5.1 also offers an option few notice: the two spouses may take two separate permits if they wish, on a separate application and the relevant fee, without the other spouse having to satisfy the policy criteria in their own right.

The tier-two provision has a valuable feature: that permit remains valid even after the child has passed 25, has married, has finished studying or has ceased to be financially dependent.

But it stops at exactly one generation: the child future spouse and underage children cannot be included on this permit.

A child who wants to study in Cyprus takes a different road — applying through the institution for a temporary student residence permit under the relevant EU Directive, and only after completing those studies filing their own Immigration Permit application.

In tier three, where the investment is real estate under categories (A) or (B), proof of payment of at least 66% of the market value must be filed with the application. Each adult child must additionally show a secure annual income of no less than EUR 50,000, plus EUR 15,000 for a spouse and EUR 10,000 for each dependent minor child.

The investment may be held jointly in the names of the applicant and the adult child, or in the applicant name alone. One thread runs through all three tiers: the permits of the spouse and of the children are cancelled with the investor permit if that permit is cancelled for any reason.

The status this programme grants, whether a visa or a residence permit, does not replace the holder's passport. The holder still travels on the passport of their own country, so the figure below belongs to the Cyprus passport and becomes the holder's only once they are issued a Cyprus passport.

According to the Passport Index of Prosperous Intelligence, on data dated 27 September 2026, the Cyprus passport reaches 191 destinations without applying for a consular visa in advance. The figure combines three forms of entry and does not count an e-Visa that must be obtained beforehand:

It is therefore a measure of how easily the holder travels, not a count of visa-free countries in the narrow sense.

For comparison, on the same source and the same method of counting, the Vietnamese passport reaches 43 destinations. The two lists of destinations do not nest inside one another, so the difference is an indication rather than a list of places newly opened.

Prosperous Intelligence dates its data and advises checking with the destination’s official authorities before travelling.

The residence permit does not by itself make its holder a Cyprus tax resident, and this is the most misunderstood point about the route.

The Tax Department page shows that is not an inference: in defining who is a tax resident, the tax authority never mentions immigration or a residence permit.

That status is decided by day count, under Article 2 of the Income Tax Law of 2002, Law No. 118(I)/2002, and there are two routes to it.

The first is the 183-day rule: staying in Cyprus for one or more periods exceeding 183 days in total during a tax year.

The counting method is set out explicitly and it is not symmetrical, so it deserves recording: the day of arrival counts as a day in Cyprus, the day of departure counts as a day outside Cyprus, arrival and departure on the same day counts as a day in, while departure and arrival on the same day counts as a day out.

The second is the 60-day rule, and it requires all four conditions together rather than any one:

Remaining in Cyprus at least 60 days in the tax year; not residing more than 183 days that year in another country; carrying on business in Cyprus and/or being employed in Cyprus, whether as employee or office holder; and maintaining a permanent residence in Cyprus, owned or rented.

A cutting clause attaches: if during the year the individual ceases to carry on business or their employment in Cyprus is terminated, they cease to be a Cyprus tax resident for that year.

The part that matters most to an investor sits in a second layer called domicile. Under the Special Defence Contribution Law No. 117(I)/2002, a resident of the Republic means someone who is a Cyprus income-tax resident and additionally has a domicile in Cyprus.

The authority states the consequence outright: an individual who does not have a domicile in Cyprus, or who is not a Cyprus tax resident, is not subject to Special Defence Contribution on rental income, interest income and dividend income.

On rental income specifically, the authority records that the contribution applied up to and including the 2025 tax year, after which it was abolished. The relief must be claimed rather than assumed: Form T.F.38.

Domicile is normally acquired at birth and follows the father's, but a deeming provision closes the gap:

Anyone who has been a Cyprus income-tax resident for at least 17 of the last 20 years immediately before the tax year is deemed to have acquired a Cyprus domicile, retained until they complete 20 years of not being a Cyprus tax resident.

Someone caught by that provision who has no Cyprus domicile of origin has one remaining door, priced in money: electing the alternative method under Article 3D of Law 117(I)/2002 as amended and circular 02/2026, extending the exemption by two further five-year periods at EUR 250,000 for each five-year period.

That 250,000 has nothing to do with this route's 300,000 euro investment threshold — different authority, different purpose, different moment. The page prints no tax rate at all, so anyone needing the bands must open the personal income tax scale separately.

The state fee schedule for this route is short and the authority prints the figures outright, but three further mandatory costs sit scattered through the policy text rather than in the schedule — and those are the ones that scale with the size of the file.

State fees: EUR 500 on submission, and the procedural page states expressly that this amount is for all persons included in the application rather than per head; plus EUR 70 for each person in the application to obtain an Aliens Registration Certificate, charged only where the person does not already hold one.

The remaining three are real costs with no published price. First, translation and certification: the policy states that all supporting documents submitted with the application must be officially translated and duly certified, so this cost scales with the volume of paperwork and the number of dependants.

Second, travel and attendance. Applications are accepted only at the Department offices in Nicosia, and issuing the residence card requires capture of biometric data — photograph, fingerprints and signature of the third country national.

That capture may be done at the time of submission, after submission, or after examination, either in Nicosia or at the district unit of the Aliens and Immigration Service of the Police for the district where the person resides.

Only a photograph is taken from those under six at the date of submission. Third, health insurance: paragraph 3.2 requires the applicant and dependent family members to submit a health insurance policy certificate covering both inpatient and outpatient care.

One warning about sequence belongs beside the fees: the procedural page states plainly that submitting this application grants the applicant no right to remain in or enter the Republic without a valid residence permit or visa.

So the cost of holding lawful status throughout the examination period is a separate item, not part of this schedule.