Spain's Golden Visa is gone: how to move to the Costa del Sol in 2026

Short answer: buying a €500,000 home in Spain no longer gets you residency. Spain ended the Golden Visa on 3 April 2025, with no replacement and no grace period. The good news? The routes that actually let you live here — the Non-Lucrative Visa and the Digital Nomad Visa — are alive, well, and arguably better suited to most people moving to the Costa del Sol anyway.

For a decade, the pitch was simple: buy property, get residency. It made Marbella, Estepona and Sotogrande a magnet for international buyers who wanted a Spanish base and a permit to go with it. That door is now closed — and a surprising number of buyers still don't know it.

The Golden Visa is gone — for good

Under Organic Law 1/2025, Spain abolished the investor "Golden Visa" on 3 April 2025. Two things matter here:

• No replacement scheme. There is no new investor route waiting in the wings. A property purchase, however large, simply does not lead to a residence permit anymore.
• No grace period. If you buy after that date, the old rules don't apply to you. (If you already hold a Golden Visa, relax — you keep your rights and renew under the old regime.)

So if you're buying in 2026 and you want to live in Spain, the purchase and the permit are now two separate jobs. The property is the easy part. The permit is where we come in.

So how do you actually move to Spain now?

For most non-EU buyers — Brits included, since Brexit — it comes down to two routes:

• The Non-Lucrative Visa (NLV) — for retirees and the financially independent who don't need to work in Spain. You show passive income or savings (in 2026, €28,800/year plus €7,200 per family member) and full private health cover.
• The Digital Nomad Visa (DNV) — for remote workers and freelancers earning from outside Spain (around €2,850/month in 2026), with the bonus of the Beckham Law flat tax rate.

There are also family routes if you have a Spanish or EU spouse, partner or child. And EU/EEA nationals skip all of this: they register freely and buy wherever they like, from San Pedro de Alcántara to Nerja.

Does buying property still help? Actually, yes

Here's the part the doom-scrollers miss. Property no longer grants residency, but it strengthens almost every residence application, because every route requires proof of accommodation in Spain. A notarised title deed (escritura) — or a long-term rental contract — is exactly that proof. So the home you were going to buy anyway becomes a supporting document, not a dead end.

The smart move is to line up the purchase and the visa together, so your NIE, your bank account, your accommodation evidence and your visa file all point in the same direction.

What you'll need

• A valid residence route (Non-Lucrative, Digital Nomad, family or work) — property alone is not enough
• A NIE number to complete any purchase
• Proof of sufficient income or savings for the chosen visa
• Private health insurance with full Spanish cover (no co-payments)
• A Spanish bank account and notarised title deed (escritura)

The bottom line

The Golden Visa was a shortcut. Its loss isn't the catastrophe the headlines suggest — for most people, the NLV or DNV is a better fit, cheaper, and just as solid once it's done properly. What changed is the order of operations: you now choose a real residence route first, and let the property support it.

If you're weighing a purchase on the Costa del Sol, the most useful thing you can do before you sign is map the visa around it. That's a short conversation. For the full picture — every route, the money, NIE/TIE, healthcare and tax — see our complete 2026 guide to moving to the Costa del Sol. We also answer the most common versions of this in our FAQ; and if you'd like us to plan your specific move — purchase, permit and tax in one joined-up plan — get in touch.

P.S. — if a salesperson tells you in 2026 that buying property "comes with residency", that's your cue to get a second opinion. It doesn't.

This article is general information updated for 2026 and is not individual legal or tax advice. Immigration rules and income thresholds change; figures should be confirmed for your specific case.