Greece · Retirement Visa
The Greece Retirement Visa asks for 183 days a year, not just the money
The income test is 3,500 euros a month, and it has to be passive. Add a health policy and an address in Greece. Then you have to actually live there, which is what opens the door to a 7 percent tax on foreign pensions.
Greece calls it the residence permit for people with sufficient means of subsistence. Everyone else calls it the retirement visa. It's for people who live on money they don't work for, and who are ready to make Greece home rather than a long holiday.
The real gate
Greece wants you there for half of every year
Plenty of retirement visas ask one question: can you pay your own way? Greece asks that too, then adds a condition that catches people out.
You owe Greece 183 days a year, minimum. Not 183 days somewhere in Europe - in Greece. The permit runs three years, and presence is what you show again when you renew.
The retirees it fits
People living on a pension, dividends, rent or interest who want one home instead of two. A dollar income goes a long way here. Our country data puts a couple's monthly budget near $2,600, comfortably within what the visa asks you to prove.
Who should skip it
If you pictured six months in Greece and six months near the grandkids, this is the wrong permit. Half your year is spoken for. You can't take a job in Greece either, and neither can your spouse. The rule covers employment and any business of your own.
What Greece asks a retiree for
3,500 euros
Passive income a month, before family add-ons
about $4,000
183 days
Minimum time inside Greece, every single year
tested at renewal
3 years
The term before you have to file again
renews in 3-year blocks
1,000 euros
What the government charges the lead applicant
relatives are 150 each
Proving it
Where the income has to come from
The money has to be passive. A pension, an annuity, dividends, interest, rent on property you own outside Greece. A salary counts for less. Greek consulates treat a paycheck as a weaker promise than a pension, and files built on one get turned down more often.
Bring a spouse and the floor rises 20 percent, to 4,200 euros. Each child adds 15 percent, or 525 euros. A couple with one child needs roughly 4,725 euros a month.
There's a savings route if your income arrives in lumps. Greek firms put it near 42,000 euros for each year of the permit, so about 126,000 euros for a three-year one. That's around $145,000. Consulates handle it inconsistently, and a few still quote the old two-year figure. Ask yours for its own number.
The rest of the file is ordinary. Health insurance, a lease or deed for a Greek address, a clean criminal record, a valid passport, and every foreign document apostilled and translated into Greek.
- Region
- Europe
- Safety index
- 60/100
- English proficiency
- 65/100
Tax
Greece taxes a foreign pension at 7 percent, and the deadline just vanished
Article 5B of the Greek tax code lets a new arrival pay a flat 7 percent on foreign income for 15 years. The normal Greek scale reaches 44 percent. You elect it with AADE, the Greek tax office. You have to be a Greek tax resident first, which is where the 183 days pay you back.
The rule that changed in June
Almost every guide online still tells you to file by March 31. That deadline is gone. Law 5313/2026 scrapped it in June 2026, and AADE's governor is due to set a replacement. The payment date moved too, from July to the last working day of December. Check what's current before you plan around it.
What it actually covers
The Greek government's own line is that the 7 percent covers whatever foreign income you have, pensions, dividends and rent included. Some advisers read it more narrowly. Your pension also has to trace back to past employment. A rolled-over 401(k) usually works. A pure annuity may not.
What it's worth to an American
Less than the headline. The U.S. taxes its citizens wherever they live, so the 7 percent becomes a credit against your U.S. bill instead of a replacement for it. If your U.S. rate on that income is higher, you send the IRS the difference. Two things to watch. A Roth is tax-free at home and may not be in Greece. A state like California can keep taxing you, and gives no credit for what Greece took.
Greece Retirement Visa
For retirees with sufficient pension or retirement income. Allows long-term residence in Greece.
- Processing time
- ~30 days
- Timeline
- 1 year (renewable)
- Difficulty
- Easy
Key requirements
- Proof of stable pension or retirement income
- Valid passport
- Clean criminal record
- Proof of health insurance
- Proof of accommodation in Greece
About that data card
Those five requirement lines are all true, and the two tests that decide a file are missing: the 3,500 euro income floor, and 183 days a year on Greek soil. The Timeline line is wrong as well. It reads one year, but Law 5038/2023 made this permit three years, renewable three years at a time. The 30-day figure covers the permit decision once you're in Greece, not the consulate visa before it, which takes one to three months by itself. All four are with our data team.
Healthcare
The permit doesn't come with a Greek doctor
This is the part that retirees underestimate. Greece runs a national health system called ESY, and it's real value for money. Getting into it works through social security contributions, tracked under a number called an AMKA. Employees and the self-employed pay in and are covered.
On this permit you're neither. You contribute nothing, so you live on private insurance. The system doesn't spring that on you. Private cover is a condition of the permit when you apply and again at every renewal, with at least 30,000 euros of cover plus repatriation.
What the cover costs
A local comprehensive plan runs roughly 120 to 180 euros a month at 55. International plans start nearer 250. The premium that matters isn't this year's. These policies are priced in age bands and they climb steeply, so ask what the same plan costs at 75.
Emergency care is free to anyone in Greece whatever their status. You'll find English-speaking doctors in the private hospitals in Athens and Thessaloniki, and far fewer on a small island. Greece has plenty of doctors and long public waiting lists.
Who to line up before you go
Pamela Okyere
Greece Local Guide
Pamela moved to Greece after traveling through 37 countries and helps Americans settle in once the paperwork is done. Worth a call when the real question is which town you can stand in February.
ExpatInsure
Global Health Insurance
You'll be asked for proof of insurance twice over, once for the permit and once more at each renewal. Ask ExpatInsure what the same policy costs at 75, not what it costs today. Age banding is where retirees get caught.
Flamingo Compliance | Tax Residency and Visa Tracker Platform
Tax Residency and Visa Tracker Platform
Your renewal and your tax election both rest on the same day count. Flamingo logs presence as it happens, so you can prove you cleared the bar instead of rebuilding it from old boarding passes.
The parts people get wrong
How does Greece's 7 percent tax for retirees work?
Article 5B is an election, not a default. Choose it and Greece charges a flat 7 percent on your foreign income for as long as 15 years, against a scale that otherwise reaches 44 percent. You need a clean run of non-residency first, five years out of the last six. The old 31 March deadline was abolished in June 2026 and no replacement date has been published.
Can I work remotely on the Greece retirement visa?
Not safely. Greek law firms describe this permit as carrying no right to employment or economic activity in Greece, for you or your spouse. Some agency sites say remote work for a foreign employer is fine, so the sources genuinely disagree. Greece built a separate digital nomad permit for that, and it's the safer route if you'll keep earning.
What income do you need for the Greece retirement visa?
Greece wants 3,500 euros a month from a single applicant, and it has to be income you don't work for. Family raises it. Add a fifth for a spouse, then 15 percent per child. A pension is the strongest proof you can file. A salary is the weakest.
Do you really have to live in Greece half the year?
Yes, and it's the condition that rules people out. This permit expects Greece to be your actual home, and presence is checked when you renew. The Golden Visa is the opposite and has no minimum stay. If you want to keep a US base half the year, look there instead.
Does the retirement visa give me public healthcare in Greece?
No. Access to the public system follows social security contributions, and a retirement permit holder makes none. You live on private insurance, which the permit demands anyway. An emergency room will treat you regardless. Medicare will not follow you abroad.
Does time on this permit lead to Greek citizenship?
Greek naturalization needs seven years of legal residence plus an exam covering B1 Greek and Greek history and institutions. Because this permit already requires 183 days a year, the presence side takes care of itself. One caution: at least one Greek firm reports that time on a financially independent permit does not count, so confirm before you rely on it.
Can I qualify with savings instead of monthly income?
Usually yes. Practitioners quote roughly 42,000 euros for every year the permit covers, which works out around 126,000 for a three-year grant. Consulates are inconsistent here, and some still publish an older, lower figure from the days when this permit ran two years. Get the number from the consulate that will handle your file.
Does the 7 percent tax mean Americans stop paying the IRS?
No. The US taxes citizens on worldwide income wherever they live, so you keep filing a 1040 plus FBAR and FATCA. The 7 percent Greece takes becomes a foreign tax credit on Form 1116, not a substitute for your US bill. If your US rate is higher, you pay the difference at home.
Before you commit to 183 days a year
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