Subject: Residency by Investment in EU for US citizen
I'm looking into this and wondering if people have experience with this, particularly for Portugal or Spain, to share. I've poked around some of the expat boards but they seem primarily aimed at people who are immigrating under working visas. In general "golden visa" schemes seem to have fallen out of favor and are being shut down, but there are still a number of countries where it's possible at the moment. I'm old enough that this is probably the only way I could qualify for permanent EU residency with a path to citizenship, which is my goal.

One concern is how to get started. There are a number of easily-found consulting services that tout their expertise and ability to help, but I cannot tell what actual services they provide - they appear to want to connect you to a local immigration attorney which is understandable, but then what do they actually *do* other than provide information and reassurance? Before I get started with screening calls, I'm wondering about the feasibility of finding, screening, and working directly with such a lawyer. I'm guessing costs will be in the $10-20K range between travel, legal fees, government fees, etc.

Another is about the safety of the "investment". I would probably be looking at holding it in local stocks or government bonds, as buying real estate in another country feels like there are many potential ways to lose everything. Ideally it could be held in a brokerage I'm familiar with that operates there, such as say IBKR. I expect the assets to be basically flat during the holding period, but that's OK - being a fraud victim along the path is definitely not OK.