Latvia Residence Permit by Buying Property: 2026 Rules

Published: 2026-07-22 · Updated: 2026-07-24 · CORVUS Attorneys-at-Law

You've found the apartment. Central Riga, new building, the price sits comfortably above EUR 250,000, and the agent has assured you — correctly, as it happens — that the purchase qualifies you for a Latvian residence permit. Then you wire the deposit from your company account, because that's where the money sits, and without knowing it you've just disqualified the investment before the application exists.

The Latvia residence permit by buying property is a genuinely straightforward route — one of the last of its kind in the EU — but it runs on precise statutory criteria, and the expensive mistakes happen at the purchase stage, before any lawyer is usually consulted. We are CORVUS, an attorney-at-law office in Riga; this article covers what qualifies, how the payment must work, what it all costs, and what life with the permit looks like afterwards. The wider programme — Schengen terms, family coverage, timelines — lives in our complete golden visa guide; here we stay close to the property itself.

What Property Qualifies — the Four Tests

The law asks four things of the object, and all four are checkable before you sign anything.

One property, at least EUR 250,000. A single object at or above the threshold — not two apartments at EUR 125,000 each. Couples sometimes ask whether spouses can combine smaller purchases; the route is built around one qualifying object per application.

Completed and registered. The building must be finished and the property registered in the Land Book — Latvia's public land register. An apartment under construction doesn't qualify until handover and registration, however much you've paid for it. (There's an elegant bridge for off-plan buyers; we'll get to it.)

Cadastral value above EUR 80,000 — or a valuation. If the cadastral value is below EUR 80,000, which is routine for new builds where cadastral figures lag the market, you'll need a certified evaluator's report confirming a market value of at least EUR 250,000. This isn't an obstacle, just a step — but order it early, because the authority will expect it in the file, not promised for later.

Clean qualifying use. The property is the legal basis of your permit for as long as you hold the TRP — at every annual registration you confirm it's still yours. Renting it out has posed no obstacle in our practice; many clients' apartments earn income while the family uses the permit as an EU foothold.

Paying for It: the Rule That Voids Applications

The purchase price must be paid by bank transfer from the investor's personal account. Not cash — and not from a company, even one you own outright. This single rule disqualifies more otherwise-perfect purchases than any other, because it collides with how wealthy buyers habitually hold money. If your funds sit in a corporate structure, route them to your personal account first and document the path; the source-of-funds review will want to understand it anyway.

Now the fees on top of the price, all one-off. The investment state fee is 5% of the purchase price, paid when the permit is granted — EUR 12,500 at the threshold. Registering ownership costs a further 1.5% Land Register fee (capped at EUR 50,000), plus modest stamp and notary charges. Processing adds EUR 160 per applicant for standard 30-day review and EUR 45 per card. A family of four lands around EUR 17,500 in total first-year fees — the full cost breakdown itemises every line, five-year totals included.

One more number belongs in the plan: financial means. Each applicant must show funds for the stay — on the real-estate route, the 2026 reference amount is around EUR 2,340 per month for the main applicant, lower for spouse and children, evidenced by a bank statement or employment agreement.

Life After the Purchase

With the property secured, the application follows the standard investor track: documents with apostilles or legalization, submission at a Latvian embassy, OCMA review with the mandatory State Security Service opinion — realistically three to six months end to end, with extensions of two to three months a normal feature rather than a bad sign. The permit arrives for up to five years, covering your spouse and children under 18, with one short visit per year to register the annual card. No residence obligation, no language exam.

Selling is the moment that needs planning. The property is the basis of the permit: sell it without a qualifying replacement and the basis falls away — a fact you confirm at every annual registration. Transitions are entirely doable — one property to another, or property to the share-capital basis — but they're structured in advance, not improvised after a notary appointment. If a sale is anywhere on your horizon, tell your counsel before you list, not after.

Buying Off-Plan? There's a Bridge

New-build buyers face a structural problem: the best apartments sell before completion, but an unregistered apartment can't carry a permit. Latvian practice solved this with a two-step structure. You invest EUR 100,000 into the share capital of the developer's holding company now and obtain the five-year permit on that basis immediately; after handover and Land Book registration, you switch to the real-estate basis — and the share investment is typically returned to you under the programme documentation, with residence continuing uninterrupted through the switch. The mechanics live in our guide to the share-capital route, and this is exactly how residence works for buyers at major Riga developments, including Riga Waterfront, where we act as cooperation partner.

Two eligibility notes complete the picture. Citizens of Russia and Belarus cannot use this route — Latvian law currently prohibits them from acquiring real estate, with dual citizens assessed under their other passport; their open Latvian door is the EU Blue Card. And the legislative status is worth a sentence of honesty: as of July 2026 the real-estate route is fully in force, a new Immigration Law having been adopted but returned by the President for a second review — we track it daily and advise on structures that stay robust under any outcome.

Found the Property Already?

The right moment for legal review is before the purchase agreement, not after: payment mechanics, cadastral value, the seller's title and the qualifying criteria can all be verified in days. Send us the object and we'll tell you whether it carries a permit — and what the whole route will cost you, to the euro.

Contact CORVUS for an assessment of your situation →

This article is general information, not legal advice. State fees and reference amounts are set by law and reviewed annually; figures are current as of July 2026 and may change. Contact us for advice on your specific situation.

Author: Valērija Barišņikova — sworn attorney (Latvia), CORVUS Attorneys-at-Law (ZAB Corvus Vanags Legal SIA). Reviewed by Andrejs Voroncovs — sworn attorney (Latvia), founder of CORVUS Attorneys-at-Law. Mag. iur. with distinction, University of Latvia; member of the Latvian Bar Association and of its commission for tax and financial matters. Profile → The firm has handled migration cases since 2004 — hundreds of cases for clients from Russia, Ukraine, Belarus, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, Azerbaijan, Georgia, Turkey, Egypt, the UAE, India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, the USA and Canada. Member of the Russell Bedford international network.