'Residency requirements' Expat

Residency requirements

I have applied for residency in Uruguay. Since I am not yet retired, the lawyer suggested I use a sole proprietorship business for residency requirements.

The hidden costs reared their ugly head and the prices are more than we were first quoted. I can see a future problem and a large expense coming down the pike by going this route.

At the time, I was not aware that one could use rental property as an income source. When I brought this to the lawyer's attention he basically dismissed it, even tho I read it in HIS info packet. With those costs, I can see why he dismissed it.

My question is this

Does one need a lease agreement notorized at the Uruguayan Consulate in our home district to proceed with the residency using the rental income a our residency requirement?

If not, can someone advise me how to proceed using this method of payment?

We have someone who is helping us but she doesn't know the answer to this question.

Any info woud be helpful and greatly appreciated.

Thanks

Terry

Sounds like you are not getting the right help. I have suggested marriage to some friends. No income check and no criminal check. And no rules on how long you have to be married. Go to Glenns Sunday meeting there are always a few potential brides there. That's where I met my potential, she will be number 7 if we just do it.

Ask Elizabeth, my future, she is an attorney helping others through the process, as well as getting some low cost health care. She's been practicing for 27 years and has a low overhead offering discounted services.

Robert

The UK document did not have to be stamped by the Uruguayan consul in London... instead it was translated here by an official translator and certified by a senior lawyer. I also had to show UK bank statements showing the arrival of the rental income in pounds sterling and statements from my bank here showing the money arriving in the ROU in dollars on a monthly basis.

Once you have your cedula, the need for such an expensive farce disappears.

Did you use a lease agreement as your document? Did you need to have it notorized by a UK notary before bringing it to Uruguay?

Robert

Does Elizabeth have an email address. I am currently in the US and won't be back for about 6 months.

Thanks

Terry

Terry it sounds to me like you need a new lawyer - someone who is actually on your side trying to help you rather than trying to swindle you. You can use rental income as proof, you can use income from stocks and investments, you can buy government bonds, you CAN set up a unipersonal company here but that isn't really necessary, you can use your social security...there are many ways.

In reality the person you have to satisfy is the escribano (notary). The way it works is you show all the proof to the escribano and they write a letter explaining how you receive your US$500 a month. After that all your documents (bank statements, rental income etc) are not necessary, all you show to immigration is the stamped letter from your escribano.

• Using government bonds to prove income

Yes I did.

"Did you need to have it notorized by a UK notary before bringing it to Uruguay?"

No I didn't. A UK Assured Shorthold Tenancy agreement is a simple commercial agreement between landlord and tenant(s) so only required official translation and notarization here.

Did you have to set up a sole proprietorship in order to have your rental income from the UK recognized to satisfy the immigration income requirement. This is the story I am getting from the lawyer. He says I still have to have the sole proprietorship. I wonder if you had to do this also or am I getting a line of crap.

Terry

The retired person has to show a personal income of 500 U$S or more to Immigration. Insisting that a landlord incorporate himself to receive his income is like asking a bank investor to incorporate himself to receive his interest.

I did become a unipersonal business once I got my cedula... not because immigration asked me to but because I'm a small farmer and the ownership of farmland renders the owner liable to BPS payments. Unipersonal small farmers only pay half the usual BPS rate and by registering, I paid a little more but received free heathcare to the value of my total BPS contributions... an overall saving of 13000 pesos a year.

Although I´m sure that I would have no trouble getting residency if I decided to move to Uruguay, my question is is residency necessary?

Unrelated to the foregoing; is the Fox News channel available in Mont-

evideo?

There's an article about this question "is residency neccessary" in the Total Uruguay ebook guide (link below).

In general answer to your question - at the moment in Uruguay it is very easy to do pretty much everything without residency. I know someone who set up a Uruguayan business with Uruguayan employees, built buildings, has lived here for 4 years and he doesn't have residency. I know people who have bought and built houses and even lived here as many as 13 years without residency! However, as countries grow and develop they tend to get more strict on legislation...in my short time here I have already seen some changes in the residency process, so you never know when they are going to make it obligatory.

• Tourist visa v's Residency

The cost of the process, which is very low if you do it yourself. Another advantage is it gives you better access to the other mercosur countries.

DirecTV Uruguay carries various Fox news channel(s). I think Montecable does too but don't remember for sure.

Though one of the great things about living in Uruguay is not being as bombarding with overhyped news from the USA.

I like your flip of the question. Can you push this out a bit further? Are there risks or constraints associated with residency?

Thanks!

P.

There don't appear to be any ongoing burdens associated with having residency. After 10 years (if you don't get citizenship first) you get the right to vote as a resident.

Many countries (including Brazil and the USA) require tax returns and payments from those who are physically in their countries for 180 days or more in a year. ie: they consider you a resident for tax purposes based on you being there. But that doesn't mean you might not be obligated for taxes even when you aren't even there (for example rental income from a property you own there).

Uruguay seems to have the a similar rule to the 180 day rule. The specifics I don't know.

Before buying a property to rent out I'd have a nice long chat with a CPA in Uruguay and a CPA in the USA.

If you use your credit card to pay for a restaurant meal, hotel, or car rental there is an automatic refund of a portion of the IVA (sales tax). That is based simply on using a credit card, not the country of issue of the credit card or the residency of the card holder.

Hotels in Punta del Este may not charge you sales tax at all if you check in using a foreign passport. I don't think they bother to see if you also have an Uruguayan Cedula. I don't know if that no-tax offering is limited to Punta del Este Hotels or all hotels.

I am planning to apply for my residency next year and certainly won't let those two issues stop me.

Broadly speaking, ROU income tax is charged on income derived from paid work done within the ROU. Foreign income is ignored.

As a legal resident, any ROU farming profits I make are taxable here in the ROU. Farmers have two options for income tax... either a flat rate depending on the crop in question or it can be calculated from actual accounts which allows the taxpayer to charge numbers of expenses against the profits like the cost of the Dedicado connection and depreciation on the pick-up truck. The same would apply to any paid work I did for others. I am told that ROU income tax would also be payable on rental property income but I am unsure about the details of how it is charged.

I have a link to a .pdf file giving the general details somewhere and will post a link once I find it.

Investment income from ROU government bonds is tax free.

When it comes to the tourist discounts receivable on credit card transactions, I find that I can usually do better by negotiating a lower price for cash... it must be my iron elbow :-)

The law that covers this tax deducation is Ley 17.934 and although they say it is about tourism, I think for the most part it is the government trying to earn taxes from during popular "temporada" when most activities go untaxed in the very cash-based economy along the Uruguayan coast (except Punta del Este). Its a common misconception that this discount is only given on foreign credit cards, but it is on all credit cards including Uruguayan.

The discount applies on restaurants, bars, cafes, cake shops, tea rooms, hotels, motels, apart-hotels, guest houses, touristic country estates and farms (estancias y granjas turisticas). It also applies for party caterers, car rentals and the commission paid to inmobiliarias for holiday rentals.

• Ley 17.934

There have been some changes since 2009/2010. There is also tremendous confusion and lack of clarity.

The follow forum posts helps clarify some of it, the best it is possible at the moment:

• Residency Income Requirements 2011

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