The Spanish Retirement Visa Asks for Income, Not Savings

I have filed more than a thousand Spanish residence applications a year, and almost all of them are for Americans, Britons, Canadians and Australians. That volume is not a boast. It is the reason I can tell you exactly where these applications go wrong, because I watch the same handful of mistakes repeat every single week.

Here is the one that costs people the most. Every month I speak to a couple who have already decided they cannot move to Spain. They have run the numbers, someone told them they needed nearly thirty thousand euros sitting in a bank account, and they concluded it was out of reach. Then I ask what their pension pays each month, and it turns out they qualified all along.

The opposite happens just as often. Someone sells a property, has a healthy balance in the bank, applies with confidence, and gets refused. The money was there. It was in the wrong shape.

This is the single most expensive misunderstanding about the non-lucrative visa, which is the route most Americans and Britons actually use to retire in Spain. So let me set out what the rule really says, what counts, and where applications fall over.

What the law actually requires

The requirement is not a savings balance. It is a monthly figure, and it is expressed as a percentage of a Spanish index rather than a fixed sum.

The Spanish government’s own information sheet for this permit is explicit: you must show, monthly, 400% of the IPREM for yourself, and 100% of the IPREM for each family member joining you. You can read that requirement in the official sheet published by the Ministry of Inclusion, which is available in English.

The IPREM is the Public Multiple Effects Income Indicator, a reference figure Spain uses across benefits, legal aid thresholds and immigration requirements. For 2026 it stands at 600 euros a month.

That gives you the numbers everyone is looking for:

• Main applicant: 2,400 euros a month, which is 28,800 euros over a year
• Each additional family member: 600 euros a month, or 7,200 euros a year
• A couple: 3,000 euros a month between them, or 36,000 euros a year

There is a detail here worth knowing, because it works in your favor. The IPREM has not moved since 2023. It is set in the annual State Budget, and Spain has been operating on extended budgets rather than new ones, so the figure has stayed at 600 euros while wages and prices have not. In practice the bar for this visa has been falling in real terms for three years.

I would not plan around that continuing forever. But if you looked at this in 2023 and assumed the threshold had climbed since, it has not.

Income, not savings, and what that means in practice

The permit exists for people who can support themselves in Spain without working. That last part is not a technicality. This authorization does not permit work in Spain, for a Spanish employer or for yourself, and applications are refused when the file suggests otherwise.

Income that works:

• A state or occupational pension
• Rental income from property, wherever the property is
• Dividends, interest and investment income
• An annuity or a structured drawdown from a retirement account
• Income from a business you own but do not actively work in, which needs careful documentation

Income that does not work:

• Salary from ongoing employment, including remote work for an employer at home. That is a different visa
• Freelance or consultancy income you are still actively earning
• A lump sum with no recurring flow behind it, on its own

That last one is the trap. Spanish consulates and immigration offices are assessing whether you can sustain yourself for the period you are asking to reside, year after year. A large balance answers a different question from the one being asked.

This does not mean savings are useless. They can support an application, particularly where income is close to the threshold or arrives irregularly, and the government’s own guidance accepts a range of evidence including property titles, certified checks and bank certifications. But savings on their own, presented as the whole case, is where we see files fail.

The people who actually use this route

Some patterns we see most often, because abstract rules land better with faces on them:

The couple with two modest pensions. Neither pension would qualify alone. Together they clear the threshold comfortably, and they are usually the ones who almost did not apply. This is the most common profile we handle and the one most often talked out of it by bad information online.

The single applicant with one solid pension. Straightforward on the numbers. The work is in documenting the pension properly and translating it correctly, which sounds trivial and is not.

The landlord. Income comes from three or four rental properties back home. It qualifies, but rental income needs a longer evidence trail than a pension does, because it varies and because voids have to be explained.

The early retiree living off investments. The hardest of the four, not because the money is not there but because drawdown from a portfolio has to be presented as a reliable flow rather than a balance that goes up and down. It is very doable. It just needs structuring before the application, not after.

The family with school-age children. Add 600 euros a month per child to the threshold, plus school places and healthcare cover. The numbers are usually the easy part here.

What the consulate asks for besides the money

The income test is the part people worry about, but it is one item on a short list, and the others sink files just as often. The official sheet asks for public or private health insurance arranged with an insurer authorized to operate in Spain, covering the whole period you are applying for. The consulates go further and publish what they will accept: Washington wants cover with no co-payment, no waiting period and no ceiling, and London wants a policy that covers everything the Spanish public system covers. Read your own consulate’s page before you buy anything, and do not assume a travel policy will pass.

You also need a criminal record certificate from every country you have lived in during the last five years, legalized or apostilled and translated by a sworn translator, and a medical certificate stating that you do not suffer from any disease that could have serious public health repercussions under the 2005 International Health Regulations, which is the wording the consulates expect to see on the certificate itself. Each of those documents has a shelf life, and it is not the same one.

London and Washington both want the medical certificate issued within three months of the application, and the criminal record certificate within six. Other consulates word it slightly differently, so check yours before you request anything, because the order you do this in decides whether something expires while you wait.

How long it takes, and why the clock matters

Our clients usually need between one and two months to get the file ready: gathering documents, having them legalized and translated, and putting the application together the way the consulate expects it. Once it is submitted, the published decision period is two months in London and three months in Washington, and both say the clock can run longer if they ask for another document or call you in for an interview.

Put together, that is two to five months from the day you start to the day you fly, and do not forget the last step: once it is granted you have one month to collect the visa in person. Most of the delays we see are not caused by the consulate. They come from documents gathered in the wrong order, or from finding out late that one of them does not meet the requirement and has to be requested again.

The two mistakes that cause most refusals

The first is applying on the wrong shape of money, which is everything above. The second is quieter and does more damage: presenting income that technically clears the threshold but does not survive scrutiny. Income that arrived once. A rental figure that ignores months with no tenant. A currency conversion done at a favorable rate rather than an official one. Consulates read a lot of these files and they are good at spotting a number that has been dressed up.

The fix is unglamorous. Show twelve months of history, use official exchange rates, explain anything irregular before you are asked, and do not round in your own favor.

Where you will actually live matters as much as the visa

There is a second question the income test does not answer, and it is the one people think about least until they land: where in Spain. The same 2,400 euros a month buys a very different life in a coastal town in Murcia than it does in Marbella or Palma.

As we kept getting the same question, we built a free quiz that asks about your budget, income, climate and priorities and ranks 237 Spanish municipalities for you, using official data from the INE, the Catastro (Spain’s property registry), the Ministry of Health and AENA, the national airport operator. It emails you a PDF with your top fifteen towns and the visa route people with that profile usually end up using, as a starting point rather than advice on your own case.

Before you rule yourself out

If you are reading this because you concluded you did not have enough, the honest next step is to look at your monthly income rather than your balance, and to check it against the figures above. Every case turns on its own documents, and the difference between a straightforward approval and a refusal is usually in how the file is built rather than in how much money you have.

Our advisors go through the numbers with people before anyone commits to anything. And because this visa is applied for at the consulate that covers where you live rather than in Spain, it is worth checking which one that is early: we keep current pages for the Spanish consulates in the United States and in the United Kingdom, because their document requirements differ more than people expect.

Spain Non-Lucrative Visa: Common Questions

How much income do you need for the Spain non-lucrative visa?

For 2026, 400% of the IPREM monthly: 2,400 euros a month (28,800 a year) for the main applicant, plus 600 euros a month (7,200 a year) for each family member. A couple needs 3,000 euros a month between them. The IPREM has been frozen at 600 euros since 2023.

Can you work remotely on the non-lucrative visa?

No. The permit does not allow work in Spain, for a Spanish employer or for yourself, and salary from ongoing employment, including remote work, does not count toward the income requirement. Remote workers need a different visa.

Do savings alone qualify?

Usually not. Consulates assess sustainable monthly income: pensions, rental income, dividends, annuities or structured drawdowns. Savings can support a file where income is close to the threshold, but a lump sum presented as the whole case is where applications fail.

How long does the application take?

Typically two to five months end to end: one to two months to prepare the file, then a published decision period of two months in London and three in Washington, which can extend if more documents are requested. Once granted, you have one month to collect the visa in person.

About the Author

Lucía Lagunas Reyes is a lawyer qualified in Spain, MICAP 2572, and has led the immigration department at My Spain Visa since the firm was founded in 2018. She was quoted on Spanish immigration law in El País in August 2026. This article is general information as at 16 September 2026 and is not legal advice. Spanish immigration rules change, and every case turns on its own facts.

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