Anyone can print a brochure. These are the questions that show who could actually run your application.
If you have started looking for help with a Golden Visa, you have probably already met the countdown timers, the promised approvals and the brochures that never quite mention fees. The market has grown louder as it has grown smaller. The United Kingdom closed its investor route in 2022, Ireland in 2023 and Spain in 2025, and the firms competing for the programmes that remain have not always competed on honesty.
The title Golden Visa consultant tells you nothing on its own, because nobody licenses it. What separates a firm you can trust from one you cannot is how it answers a handful of direct questions. This guide sets them out, and they apply to Elite Golden Visa exactly as they apply to anyone else. For a summary of how we work, our page on choosing a consultant is a useful companion.
| The fastest way to judge a Golden Visa consultant is to listen to how they answer questions about their own money. |
What a Golden Visa consultant actually is
A Golden Visa consultant is a private firm that coordinates a residency by investment application. It explains the programme, gathers your documents, arranges translations and introduces you to independent lawyers and regulated investment providers. In most countries the consulting role itself is not separately regulated, and anyone can register a company in Lisbon, Milan, Dubai or London and describe it this way.
What separates one firm from another is not the label but what it can show you: independent lawyers it can name, investment providers regulated by a national authority, written terms, and claims an outsider could verify.
What a consultant is not
A consultant is not a financial adviser, a law firm or a fund manager, and each of those is a separate role with its own regulator. Because it is not a financial adviser, a consultancy cannot tell you whether an investment suits your circumstances; that judgement belongs to an adviser regulated where you live. Legal advice comes from independent, qualified immigration lawyers. Qualifying funds are run by managers answerable to their national regulator, the CMVM in Portugal and CONSOB in Italy.
Elite Golden Visa works within those boundaries. We coordinate the process and make introductions. We do not assess whether an investment suits you, we do not give legal or tax opinions, and we never hold client money. If a firm presents itself as consultant, adviser and lawyer all at once, ask which regulator supervises each of those roles.
| Role | What they do for you | What should worry you |
| Consultancy | Explains the programme, gathers documents once, coordinates translations, introductions and timelines | Claiming to advise on investments, law or tax as well |
| Immigration lawyer | Gives legal advice, prepares and files the application, represents you before the authorities | A lawyer who is not named, not independent or not individually qualified |
| Financial adviser | Judges whether an investment fits your finances, in your own country | Working without authorisation from a regulator |
| Fund manager | Runs the qualifying fund and answers to its regulator | Advising you personally on whether the fund suits you |
How consultants are paid
Golden Visa consultants earn money in one of three ways. Some charge only a client fee. Some charge nothing visible and earn entirely through commissions from the products they introduce. Many sit in between, and Elite Golden Visa is one of them: we receive placement or introductory fees from some funds, which is the payment a fund makes for introducing an investor, alongside a separate client service fee.
None of these models is wrong in itself. The dangerous one is the model nobody explains. A consultancy described as free is not free; it is paid through commission instead, so its income depends on where your money goes rather than on how well your application is run. When you compare quotes, separate what you pay the firm from what a third party pays the firm because of you, and ask about the second first.
We often meet families who arrive with a shortlist of funds another firm built for them, without anyone having said who was paid to build it. Ask that question before you accept any shortlist, including one from us.
Four red flags
Each of these is a factual test you can run from a firm’s emails and brochures before you ever pick up the phone.
Guaranteed approval is the first. No private firm controls a government decision. Portuguese permits are granted or refused by AIMA, the immigration agency, and Italian ones by an inter-ministerial committee and the consulates. A firm promising approval is claiming a power it does not have.
Promised returns are the second. A firm quoting investment returns to sell residency is marketing an investment, not a visa. In the UK that activity falls under the financial promotion restriction in Section 21 of the Financial Services and Markets Act 2000, and EU countries police it under their own securities rules. A qualifying investment can lose money, and material that leaves that out is selling rather than informing.
Invented deadlines are the third. A real change in the law is public, dated and citable, and Portugal’s 2026 nationality reform appeared in the official journal before it took effect. Invented urgency looks different. It arrives as a countdown clock, a final allocation or a price that expires on Friday afternoon. Ask for the dated source, because a real deadline always has one.
A refusal to put fees in writing is the fourth. A firm reluctant to commit its fees to paper before you commit is showing you how it does business. One page is enough, and under UK consumer law, withholding that information can amount to a misleading omission (Consumer Protection from Unfair Trading Regulations 2008).
The eight questions to ask
Put these to any consultant on a first call. The right hand column describes the answer that should end the conversation.
| Question | Why it matters | The answer that should worry you |
| Who pays you, and how much? | Commissions decide which options you are shown. | ‘Our service is completely free to you.’ |
| What are you, legally? | Each role has its own regulator. | A firm claiming to be all of them, or unable to say. |
| Who gives the legal advice on my file? | Filings are legal work for named, independent lawyers. | An anonymous ‘in-house legal team’. |
| Can I have your fees in writing today? | Written terms before commitment are basic practice. | A verbal figure ‘to be confirmed’. |
| What is your approval rate, and how is it evidenced? | Claims need evidence behind them. | A round percentage with no method, or any promise of approval. |
| What happens if the rules change mid-application? | Programmes change, as Portugal’s did in 2026. | ‘That won’t affect you.’ |
| Do you earn more if I choose one option over another? | Uneven commissions are a conflict of interest. | ‘We have no conflicts’, from a firm paid by providers. |
| When would you tell me not to apply? | A firm paid per sign-up has a reason to enrol everyone. | A firm that has never turned anyone away. |
Good answers share three qualities. They are specific, they are written down, and they are comfortable with the words ‘it depends’. A firm willing to tell you early that a route does not suit you is showing the honesty you will need if something goes wrong later.
The facts a consultant should know cold
A competent consultant can state the basic rules of each programme they handle from memory. The table below is a quick test for the two programmes Elite Golden Visa works with. A firm that blends Portugal’s rules into Italy’s has already failed it.
| Portugal Golden Visa | Italy Investor Visa | |
| Investment | €500,000 into a CMVM regulated fund | One of four routes, not combinable, from €250,000 to €2,000,000 |
| Minimum stay | 7 days a year on average | None |
| Pre-approval | None; you invest, then apply | Nulla Osta granted before any capital moves |
| Citizenship | Eligible after 10 years (7 for EU and CPLP), from the first permit | Eligible after 10 years of legal residence |
| Language | Portuguese A2 | Italian B1 |
These details are current as of August 2026, and both programmes can change. An honest firm tells you so without being asked.
Ask us everything on this list
We are happy to take every question here on a first call. Work through the table and grade our answers against the right hand column, exactly as you would with any other firm.
Some of our answers, in advance. We receive placement or introductory fees from some funds, alongside a separate client service fee. Our fee schedule runs to a single page, and you can have it before we ask anything of you. Legal advice on every file comes from independent, qualified immigration lawyers, who are named to you at the start. Our founding team has guided more than 150 families through residency by investment, and we can document that figure on request. And you can check the company itself: Elite Golden Visa is company SC852697, registered in Scotland, with offices in Edinburgh and Lisbon.
Where to start
This choice matters for a decade. A residency runs through renewals, rule changes and, in time, a citizenship application, and your consultant is your channel for all of it. Choose the firm that still answers plainly when the questions become uncomfortable, whoever that turns out to be, even if it is not us. If you would like to hear our answers, get in touch and bring the table.
Elite Golden Visa provides immigration consultancy services. We do not provide financial or legal advice. All legal services are delivered by independent, qualified immigration lawyers. All investment decisions should be made with independent financial advice.
This content is for informational purposes only and does not constitute financial advice or an offer to invest. Any investment carries risk, including the potential loss of capital. Past performance is not indicative of future results.
