Malta Permanent Residence Programme

On the official brochure dated January 2025 issued by Residency Malta Agency, the property condition can be met in two ways, both in Malta or Gozo:

Alongside it sits a separate capital test, and that test also has two ways of being met:

The applicant must in addition be in receipt of stable and regular financial resources sufficient to maintain themselves and their dependants without recourse to Malta social assistance system. The brochure states expressly that in case of conflicting views between that document and the legislation, it is S.L. 217.26 that prevails

Regulation 10, headed Rights conferred by Certificate, is where the programme states most plainly what it creates — and it confers the right together with three limits written into the same provision.

A certificate issued by the Agency entitles the beneficiary and the dependants named on it to reside, settle or stay indefinitely in Malta. The first limit sits inside that same sentence: the right holds only provided the beneficiary and the approved dependants adhere to all the obligations and conditions set out in the regulations.

The second closes a door readers often assume is open: the certificate shall not, by itself, entitle the holder to any other rights mentioned in the Immigration Regulations.

The third is an obligation on the authority rather than the holder, and it shows the right is supervised continuously rather than granted once and forgotten: the Agency shall monitor adherence by the beneficiary and the approved dependants to all obligations and conditions.

In the circumstances set out in Regulation 17 the beneficiary ceases to benefit from the certificate and from all benefits it confers. While an application is still running, the Agency issues a temporary residence permit, renewable for further periods of one year each.

The qualifying property must be held for at least five years, and after that period a continuing obligation remains: the beneficiary must still hold a residential property in Malta or Gozo, owned or leased. The five-year mark changes the form of the obligation rather than ending it.

S.L. 217.26, in the version consolidated after L.N. 310 of 2024 and L.N. 146 of 2025, sets a chain of deadlines running from two points. The first is the filing date: the first part of the administration fee must reach the agency within one month, failing which the agency may refuse the application at once.

The second point is the issue of the Letter of Approval in Principle. Within two months of that date, the applicant pays the balance of the administration fee and the fees for those dependants who are charged.

Within eight months of the same date, the applicant must pay the contribution, present title to a qualifying property, provide evidence of the donation, and present a health insurance policy.

On filing, the applicant may apply for a one-year temporary residence permit for themselves and their dependants. It can be renewed year by year, provided all documents for the application are submitted within six months of filing.

The eligibility conditions are: being a third country national, non-EEA and non-Swiss. Not hailing from sanctioned countries, on a list announced from time to time by Residency Malta Agency itself — a moving condition, capable of changing after a file has been lodged.

Not being a beneficiary under other pertinent regulations and schemes. Being a fit-and-proper individual with a clean criminal record; and not posing any potential threat to national security, public policy, public health or public interest.

An application can be submitted only through a licensed agent, never directly

The programme allows up to four generations to be included in one application, and each dependant of the main applicant carries a separate fee.

That scope has since been narrowed: the Amendment Regulations of 2025, namely Legal Notice 146 of 2025 made under the Immigration Act Chapter 217, amend the definition of dependant at paragraph (d) by replacing the words "spouse who proves" with the words "spouse, who is not in a full-time employment, and who proves".

The same instrument also deletes the limb of the definition of contribution that related to an application for the inclusion of a dependant on a certificate under regulation 11

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 Malta passport and becomes the holder's only once they are issued a Malta passport.

According to the Passport Index of Prosperous Intelligence, on data dated 27 September 2026, the Malta passport reaches 202 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 programme own regulations establish no tax regime, and more strikingly they actively push the beneficiary out of Malta other preferential tax regimes.

The governing instrument is Subsidiary Legislation 217.26, the Malta Permanent Residence Programme Regulations, made by Legal Notice 121 of 2021 and amended by Legal Notices 57 and 310 of 2024 and 146 of 2025.

The eligibility conditions require the applicant to prove to the Agency that he is not a person who benefits under six named sets of tax rules.

They are the Residents Scheme Regulations, the Highly Qualified Persons Rules, the High Net Worth Individuals — Non-EU/EEA/Swiss Nationals Rules, the Malta Retirement Programme Rules, the Qualifying Employment in Innovation and Creativity (Personal Tax) Rules, and the Residence Programme Rules.

That condition does not bite only at application: the text requires it to be proved as from the appointed day and throughout the entire duration and persistence of the certificate.

The same condition applies separately to an approved dependant included on the certificate. In other words the MPRP and Malta preferential tax programmes are mutually exclusive rather than cumulative.

Running the other way, the regulations impose tax-data sharing:

Regulation 21(5) empowers the Agency to furnish the Commissioner for Tax and Customs with the name and surname, nationality, date of birth, residence address in the original jurisdiction of tax residence and tax information registration number of the beneficiary and of the dependants included on a certificate.

Regulation 21(3) further empowers the Agency to furnish information it has obtained to the Commissioner for Tax and Customs, the Financial Intelligence Analysis Unit, the Malta Financial Services Authority, the Malta Business Registry, the Commissioner of Police and any other authority legally empowered to request it.

A smaller detail sits in the Third Schedule, added by Legal Notice 146 of 2025: the annual licence fee payable by an agent is EUR 5,000, and that figure is exclusive of any applicable taxes

The charges payable are set out below in euro (EUR):

The administration fee is paid in two parts: EUR 15,000 on filing and EUR 45,000 after the Letter of Approval in Principle. The EUR 37,000 contribution is the same whether the qualifying property is owned or rented.

Not every dependant is charged the EUR 7,500. The spouse, minor children and adult children with a disability are exempt; the fee applies only to dependent children aged 18 to under 29 and to parents or grandparents.

The agency's brochure dated January 2025 still prints the older figures: a EUR 50,000 administration fee, a contribution of EUR 30,000 when buying or EUR 60,000 when renting, and EUR 10,000 per dependant. The brochure itself states that the regulations prevail in case of conflict, so TLT follows the consolidated regulations.

On top of these come recurring costs: the minimum annual rent where the lease route is chosen, and health insurance covering all risks normally covered for Maltese nationals, maintained for the life of the residence card.