Romania Golden Visa

Romania doesn’t have an in-force Golden Visa program you can apply for right now. The official immigration and foreign affairs pages still point to the standard long-stay routes, like commercial, professional and self-employed visas, plus the usual short-stay tourist visa. A draft residency-by-investment law has been reported, but it hasn’t been confirmed as an active program in the official portals.

That matters because the difference is big. A real Golden Visa would be a passive, investment-only route to residency. What Romania actually has today is a system built around active business or work, so you usually need to show a company role, self-employment or another qualifying activity. There’s no official five-year investor permit with a fixed €400,000 entry point on the government sites.

If you’re looking at investor-type options now, the main route is the long-stay visa for commercial activities, usually called D/AC. That route is for foreign nationals who are or will become shareholders, associates or managers in Romanian companies and it requires prior economic approval from the relevant investment authority. The EU immigration portal also says self-employed third-country nationals must first get a long-stay visa for professional, commercial or economic activities, then apply in Romania for a temporary residence permit.

The current business permits are still much more traditional than a Golden Visa. They’re generally valid for up to one year and can be renewed. In some cases, where the investment is more than €500,000 or the business creates more than 50 jobs, temporary residence can be extended for successive periods of up to three years.

• Short-stay visa (C): for tourism, private visits and short business trips, with stays up to 90 days in any 180-day period.
• Long-stay business routes (D): for commercial, professional or economic activity, followed by a residence permit after arrival.
• Draft Golden Visa: reported in commentary, but not confirmed as an active visa category in official Romanian immigration guidance.

So if you’re scanning Romania for a passive residency-by-investment option, the honest answer is simple: it’s not there in a usable form. If you want a live route into the country, you’ll need to work with the existing business and residence categories instead.

Romania doesn’t currently have a live Golden Visa program to apply for. The 400,000 EUR investor residency idea that made headlines was only a draft and it was withdrawn after state security concerns, so there’s no active law, fee schedule or official application route behind it right now.

That means there’s no real “who qualifies” checklist for a Romania Golden Visa in 2026, because the program itself doesn’t exist in force. Any online references to a five-year permit tied to passive investment, real estate or government bonds are describing a shelved proposal, not something you can submit at a consulate.

What investors can use instead

If you want a Romania residence route tied to business or capital, you have to use the ordinary immigration channels already on the books. These are active, but they’re not a branded Golden Visa and they don’t work like passive residency.

• Business shareholders or managers: foreign nationals who take an active role in a Romanian company can apply under the commercial activities or investment-based long-stay routes.
• Active business investors: current professional summaries point to minimum capital levels of about 100,000 EUR to 150,000 EUR, plus a business plan and job-creation requirements of roughly 10 to 15 local jobs.
• Proof of funds: applicants also need to show enough means to support themselves, but the exact monthly threshold depends on the route and isn’t published as a Golden Visa standard.

These routes are work-heavy. You’re not just wiring money and waiting for a permit, you’re showing an active company structure, management role and compliance with Romanian immigration rules.

What the shelved Golden Visa would have required

For context only, the withdrawn draft would have asked for a minimum 400,000 EUR investment in one of four buckets, government bonds, real estate held for at least five years, ASF-authorized funds or shares in Romanian-listed companies. It also would have allowed a renewable five-year permit with no minimum stay requirement, but none of that's law now.

So the short answer is simple: nobody qualifies for a Romania Golden Visa today because Romania doesn’t have one in force. If you’re looking to move through investment, the only real path is the standard business-residence route under general immigration law.

There isn’t a real Romania Golden Visa to apply for right now. Romania doesn't have an in-force residency-by-investment program and there’s no official government document list, fee schedule or application form for a Golden Visa category.

A draft bill did circulate in Parliament, with a proposed €400,000 investment threshold and a five-year renewable residence permit tied to eligible assets like real estate, government bonds, ASF-authorized funds or listed shares. But that proposal was withdrawn and never became law, so any document checklist you see online is still just guesswork.

What the official process covers instead

Romanian authorities only publish requirements for existing long-stay visa categories, not a Golden Visa. If a future investor route ever gets adopted, it would almost certainly use the same basic paperwork standards seen in other D visas, but that’s not the same thing as an actual approved program.

• Valid passport: Usually expected to remain valid beyond the visa period.
• Application form: Completed through the official visa system for the relevant long-stay category.
• Recent photo: Passport-style, per consular rules.
• Proof of means: Required in standard D-visa cases, but there’s no Golden Visa-specific threshold.
• Health insurance: Commonly required for long-stay visas, though no investor-program rule exists.
• Police clearance: Often requested for long-stay files, usually from the country of residence.
• Accommodation proof: Rental contract, ownership papers or host declaration, depending on the visa type.

Translations and legalization

Foreign documents for Romanian immigration are generally expected to be translated into Romanian by an authorized translator. Depending on the country that issued the document, you may also need an apostille or consular legalization. That’s standard practice for Romanian visas, even though there’s no investor visa law to point to yet.

The short version is simple, if annoying: there’s no official Romania Golden Visa file to prepare because there’s no live program. If a version of it returns in the future, the first place to check will be the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the General Inspectorate for Immigration, not third-party summaries.

Source

Romania doesn’t have an official Golden Visa fee schedule yet. The draft investment-by-residence program is still not in force, so any site quoting a fixed application charge for the Golden Visa itself is guessing. For now, investors go through the standard long-stay route, then the residence permit process after arrival.

What you can budget for now

The one fee Romania does publish clearly is the long-stay visa charge. That applies to the current investment and commercial routes, including type D visas used by foreign investors and company directors.

• Long-stay type D visa: 120 EUR
• Golden Visa application fee: Not officially published yet
• Golden Visa dependent fee: Not officially published yet

If the draft Golden Visa eventually becomes law, the 400,000 EUR investment threshold would still sit on top of these normal immigration costs. There’s no official confirmation yet on any extra government fee, renewal fee or family surcharge tied to that draft program.

Other costs you’ll probably face

The government fee is only part of the bill. Most applicants also pay for health insurance, document translation, legalization and sometimes legal help and those prices are set by private providers, not the Romanian state.

• Health insurance: Required for long-stay applications, price depends on age and coverage
• Translations and legalization: Usually needed for company papers, criminal records and financial documents
• Legal or immigration support: Optional, but common for investor cases
• Residence permit card fee: Required after arrival, but the official amount isn’t clearly published in the English-language material we reviewed

If you’re bringing family, plan for separate visas and permit cards for each dependent unless a future Golden Visa law says otherwise. That means more paperwork and more cost, even if the core investment stays the same. Romania may eventually publish a proper Golden Visa fee table, but right now it hasn’t done that yet.

Romania doesn’t have a confirmed, officially operating Golden Visa program. That means there’s no verified investment threshold, no special Golden Visa fee and no official fast-track portal to apply through. If you’re coming in as an investor or business owner, the route on paper is still the standard long-stay visa.

Where you actually apply

The official application is filed abroad, through a Romanian embassy or consulate in your country of residence. You don’t start with an in-country Golden Visa submission, because that program hasn’t been officially launched. The long-stay visa is the entry step, then you move to a residence permit in Romania under the relevant category.

What the standard route looks like

For investors and business activity, the relevant category is the long-stay visa for economic activities or D/AE. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs says this visa is the official path for third-country nationals carrying out economic activity in Romania. The accessible consular material confirms the basic visa framework, but it doesn’t give a verified Golden Visa-specific list of benefits, duration or renewal rules.

• Submit the file abroad: File your application at a Romanian diplomatic mission or consular office.
• Pay the visa fee: The fee is charged before processing. The ministry says visa fees are collected in EUR and in some places may also be collected in USD or local currency.
• Bring the basics: The verified minimum documents include a passport valid for at least 3 months beyond the visa validity, a recent color passport photo and proof of legal residence in the country where you apply.
• Enter on the long-stay visa: The long-stay visa is the entry document, then you apply in Romania for the residence permit tied to your purpose of stay.

The part that frustrates people is the lack of an official Golden Visa framework. Third-party claims about a €400,000 route and other investor thresholds aren’t backed by Romanian government sources, so don’t plan around them. Until Bucharest publishes a real program, the safest move is to work with the standard investor or business visa channels and get the paperwork right the first time.

Romania doesn’t have a live Golden Visa program yet. What’s on the table is a draft residence-by-investment scheme, so there’s no official, locked-in renewal rule to rely on right now. That matters, because the details people repeat online, fees, filing windows, even the paperwork, are still tied to a proposal, not an in-force immigration route.

The draft version is built around a 5-year temporary residence permit. If it ever becomes law, that permit would be renewable and would sit on top of a qualifying investment of at least €400,000, but the government hasn't published an operative version of the program through the General Inspectorate for Immigration.

Here’s the part that’s fairly consistent across the draft materials:

• Initial validity: 5 years.
• Renewal: The permit is described as renewable, so long as the qualifying investment is still in place.
• Investment maintenance: The draft text ties renewal to keeping the qualifying investment above the €400,000 threshold for the life of the permit.
• Physical presence: The proposal says there’s no minimum stay requirement to keep the status, which is one reason investors like the idea.

That said, the renewal mechanics are still fuzzy. There’s no official filing schedule, no confirmed document list and no public IGI rulebook for this category. So if you see exact claims about how many days before expiry you must apply, treat them as guesswork unless the law is actually enacted.

The expected endgame is straightforward. After 5 years of legal residence under the investment permit, the draft points toward long-term residence, then later citizenship under Romania’s normal framework. That part also isn’t special yet, it’s just how the proposal is framed. For now, anyone planning around this route should assume the program’s duration and renewal rules can still change before it ever goes live.

Source

Romania doesn’t have a confirmed Golden Visa tax break. The investor-residence idea is still in draft form, so any future permit would fall under the same tax rules that apply to everyone else. That means no special exemption just because you got in through investment.

What triggers Romanian tax residency

ANAF looks at three main tests: whether you have a domicile in Romania, whether your center of vital interests is here and whether you spend more than 183 days in Romania in any consecutive 12-month period. If you cross that 183-day line, you’re expected to file a fiscal residency questionnaire within 30 days.

Once you’re treated as a Romanian tax resident, the rule is simple, if annoying: Romania taxes your worldwide income for the period you’re resident. Before that, you’re taxed only on Romanian-source income.

• Resident: taxed on worldwide income for the period of Romanian residency.
• Non-resident: taxed only on Romanian-source income.
• 183-day rule: one of the main residency triggers.

How foreign income is taxed

Romania applies a flat 10% personal income tax to most income categories, including employment, self-employment and many investment streams. So if a future Golden Visa holder becomes tax resident, foreign income doesn’t get a special investor discount. It falls under the normal resident rules, subject to treaty relief where available.

For non-residents, Romania generally taxes only income sourced in Romania. In some cases, treaty protection can reduce that tax or wipe it out entirely. If there’s no double-tax treaty and you’re not covered by EU rules, some Romanian-source income can be taxed at 16%.

What to keep an eye on

Romania’s double-tax treaties matter a lot here, because they determine who has the primary right to tax certain income. The treaty rules depend on your tax residence, not on the visa sticker in your passport.

There’s also a reporting side to this. If you become resident, don’t assume the tax office will sort it out for you. The residency declaration is on you and getting it wrong can create a mess fast.