Talk Quesada forum

Hi, I have searched through previous posts on this topic and can't see the answer. I thought I understood it, but it appears not. The Govt advice now says that if you want to be in Spain post Brexit for more than 90 days you need to become resident. We have residencia green certificates because we had them when we lived and worked here permanently for 8 years until 2013 and didn't officially cancel them when we moved back. From 2014 we have, however, paid non resident taxes and lived primarily in the UK (> 183 days). We still come to Quesada a lot to our house here and would like to continue to do that in the future, probably for more than 90 days per year. Other parts of the Govt website say that residents should declare their worldwide income in Spain, but although you have to be a resident to stay more than 90 days surely the resident tax situation only kicks in after 183 days? We are guessing that our existing residencia certificates will still be valid unless anyone knows differently, but were unsure why our tax declaration should be affected? Can anyone clarify this for us please?

The green card you have, which we refer to as residencia, is not. It is a register of EU foreign nationals residing in Spain and you could become a EU resident for stays of more than 90 days without becoming a fiscal resident and having to pay taxes in Spain which only kicks in if you spend more than 183 days a year here.

This will pretty much disappear after Brexit. Even those who are permanent residents in Spain will have to change the green card to a non-EU ID card and become non-EU residents.
Anyone wanting to come to Spain who is not a permanent resident will, more than likely, be only allowed to stay for a period of up to 90 days unless (but not confirmed) they obtain a visa for stays of longer. The green card will no longer be accepted as we will no longer be in the EU. It may also be that the period of stay will be up to 180 days but with no more than 90 days at one times as happens with the USA.

Up until now, as EU residents, countries like Spain and France have tended to turn a blind eye to long stays as, after all, we are all in the EU and haven't even recorded your entry and exit dates. This will definitely change and passports for non permanent residents will probably be stamped with an entry date and permission to remain until (3 months hence).

So, no, your existing residencia certificates will not still be valid as you will no longer be a EU citizen.

Be careful if you haven't cancelled your original cards by doing a Bajo when you left as you may have to prove to the Spanish authorities that you are no longer a fiscal resident and they could claim back taxes for the years you missed although I cannot understand why you are getting non-resident tax bills if you haven't cancelled or changed your resident status.

Of course, depending on treaties and the withdrawal agreement, nothing may change at all but, at the moment, it will as the UK gov is saying it will not accept freedom of movement for EU citizens after Brexit and the other countries will reciprocate.

OK thanks, that makes sense for now. We don't get non resident tax 'bills' as such, we have just voluntarily self declared and paid non resident taxes via our asesor since 2014. We never got round to officially cancelling the residencia - I suppose to begin with it was uncertain where we would end up longer term. Maybe we should if it can be backdated. Our SIP cards got automatically cancelled though some time after we stopped paying in via PAYE so perhaps the green card did too. We can easily prove we've not lived here via other means if necessary - not least because we simultaneuosly started paying resident tax in the UK. Thanks for your help.

This is an interesting post. Saying so, so I can easily track it in the future. A bit like ' favoriting' something for future reference, not sure how else to do that in the forum

Shiva wrote:This is an interesting post. Saying so, so I can easily track it in the future. A bit like ' favoriting' something for future reference, not sure how else to do that in the forum

Shiva, if you scroll right down to the very bottom of the page there's an option to bookmark topic. It will just mark it in a separate folder on this site for you to look at in future

Thanks, still can't see it, but that might be my device settings. Will look on my PC.

For the official up to date information keep checking citizens advice Spain https://www.facebook.com/groups/citizensinspain/ or https://www.citizensadvice.org.es/

For all practical intents and purposes you cannot be resident in two places at the same time so by moving back to UK in 2013 you will effectively have given up your Spanish residency and you will not be able to dust it off now to use to exceed a 90 day limitation.

Paul Uden wrote:OK thanks, that makes sense for now. We don't get non resident tax 'bills' as such, we have just voluntarily self declared and paid non resident taxes via our asesor since 2014. We never got round to officially cancelling the residencia - I suppose to begin with it was uncertain where we would end up longer term. Maybe we should if it can be backdated. Our SIP cards got automatically cancelled though some time after we stopped paying in via PAYE so perhaps the green card did too. We can easily prove we've not lived here via other means if necessary - not least because we simultaneuosly started paying resident tax in the UK. Thanks for your help.

In which case I would imagine your asesor (or gestor) cancelled your residency in Spain if he is now paying non-resident tax on your behalf.

marcliff wrote:

Paul Uden wrote:OK thanks, that makes sense for now. We don't get non resident tax 'bills' as such, we have just voluntarily self declared and paid non resident taxes via our asesor since 2014. We never got round to officially cancelling the residencia - I suppose to begin with it was uncertain where we would end up longer term. Maybe we should if it can be backdated. Our SIP cards got automatically cancelled though some time after we stopped paying in via PAYE so perhaps the green card did too. We can easily prove we've not lived here via other means if necessary - not least because we simultaneuosly started paying resident tax in the UK. Thanks for your help.

In which case I would imagine your asesor (or gestor) cancelled your residency in Spain if he is now paying non-resident tax on your behalf.

They obviously must have cancelled fiscal residency, but as the green certificate is about being on the register of foreigners( which, has been previously pointed out) is separate from fiscal residency, who knows, the OP could still be on the register. But also the point that post 2020 it will be defunct anyway. Just interesting if the OP was thinking about moving back to Spain permanently this year the green cert may possibly still be valid for enabling the expedited shift to a full TIE that UK folk will need to move too. Probably one of many as yet untested grey areas ...