Allen and Olivia sold their London flat in 2022 and went looking for somewhere warmer to raise their two children. They tried for Spanish residency twice — once from Istanbul, once from Buenos Aires — and on the third attempt finally landed it from inside Spain itself, on the Digital Nomad Visa. They jokingly call themselves climate refugees. The full story is messier, more interesting, and a useful map of where Spanish consular practice draws its lines.
The clients
Allen is a British solicitor; Olivia, a British professional planning her family’s relocation. By the time they came to us they had already lived in Turkey for over a year on a Turkish residence permit, sold the London flat, and were in the closing weeks of Olivia’s second pregnancy. They had two children to think about, passive rental income from a UK property and from a leased vehicle, substantial savings sitting in Turkish lira, and a clear preference for Spain over the alternatives — Slovenia, Greece, Croatia.
Their reasoning for Spain over Greece was practical, not romantic:
- Education. The international-school options they wanted exist in any large or mid-sized Spanish city; in Greece, comparable schools cluster in Athens and constrain where the family can live.
- Travel. Spain is a road trip away from France, Italy, and Switzerland. Greece, despite Schengen membership, is a more isolated proposition for European weekend travel.
- Climate. The pivot reason. Both Allen and Olivia were finished with British winters.
Attempt one: Istanbul, on the Non-Lucrative Visa
Their first plan was the Non-Lucrative Visa (NLV), filed at the Spanish Consulate in Istanbul. The income was right for it: rental from a UK property, a leased car generating monthly income, and savings well above threshold. The only condition we had to clear was Allen’s UK solicitor practice — since autumn 2020 the Spanish authorities have required NLV applicants to demonstrate they are not actively employed anywhere, on the basis that the visa is for passive-income residence and not for remote workers. Allen agreed to formally resign before submission.
That is when the consulate moved the goalposts. Mid-process, Istanbul informed us that they would no longer accept NLV applications from foreign nationals whose Turkish residence permit was only one or two years old. The reasoning is consular discretion: a short-tenure third-country residency does not establish stable enough ties for the consulate’s liking. We could not argue around it, and the file did not go in.
Lesson on consular discretion. Consulate-by-consulate policies on third-country applicants do change, often without published notice. If your route depends on applying through a particular consulate while you are resident in another country, build a contingency. Allen and Olivia did not have one.
Attempt two: Buenos Aires
The family flew to Argentina in November 2022, partly to try the Spanish Consulate there and partly because Olivia was due to give birth — their second child was born in Buenos Aires in late December and acquired Argentine citizenship at birth. Then Argentina became unexpectedly popular among Russian and other third-country applicants seeking Spanish residency, the consulate’s appointment slots evaporated, and the wait stretched from weeks to months. After several rounds of trying for a slot, we accepted the route was not going to work in any reasonable timeframe.
Attempt three: Spain, on the Digital Nomad Visa
By 2023 Spain had introduced the Digital Nomad Visa under the Startups Law (Ley 28/2022). The route fit Allen better than the NLV had: it allows remote work for non-Spanish employers and clients, it is filed online while the applicant is physically in Spain, and it does not require third-country residence at all. The family flew to Spain on Schengen visa-waiver entry. We prepared the file.
The first submission was refused. The reason was technical: Allen had listed two distinct income streams — one as a self-employed UK consultant and one as an employee of a UK company — and the case officer treated the mix as ambiguous. Our reading was different (there is no rule against mixed income on the DNV), but the appeal window was short and the family wanted certainty rather than principle. We refiled with a single income stream — the self-employment — and held the employed income in reserve.
One month later, Allen’s residence permit was approved. Three weeks after that, the dependents’ permits followed: Olivia, the elder child on the Schengen visa we had arranged, and the youngest on her Argentine passport (no Schengen visa required for Argentine citizens to enter Spain).
Outcome
The family moved into a Spanish home and have been there since. The DNV residence is initially three years, extendable for a further two — five years to permanent residency. By contrast, the NLV would have given a single year on first issue, with renewals.
“Honestly, the digital nomad visa turned out to be the better fit for us. It runs three years, then two more, then we can apply for permanent residency. And we can keep our savings invested productively, which the non-lucrative route does not really allow.”
— Allen, on choosing the Digital Nomad Visa
On settling in, Allen’s verdict was that Spain was the easiest of the three countries the family had passed through. “In Turkey it was difficult to function without Turkish — even the couriers spoke only Turkish. In Spain almost everyone we deal with speaks English, so the language gap has not been a barrier yet.”
What this case shows
Three things worth lifting out of Allen and Olivia’s file for any UK family considering a similar move:
- Route selection beats route loyalty. The NLV looked right on paper and was wrong in practice. The DNV was a route they did not consider until it appeared mid-journey. The decision to switch routes is the decision that worked.
- Consular policy travels poorly. The Istanbul rejection on third-country residence tenure was not in any published rule we could point to. Build flexibility into the application calendar so a refusal at one consulate does not strand the family for months.
- Mixed income invites questions on the DNV. Mixed self-employment and employment income is technically permissible, but it creates an evidentiary burden that some case officers will not absorb. If you can lead with one cleanly-documented stream, do.
Last updated: 1 May 2026. Legal basis (unchanged): Digital Nomad Visa under Ley 14/2013, article 74 quinquies (added by Ley 28/2022 of 21 December 2022); applications processed by Unidad de Grandes Empresas (UGE). Non-Lucrative Visa now governed by Real Decreto 1155/2024, articles 61–64. Practice update: UGE’s documentation expectations for DNV cases have tightened materially since 2024 — particularly around income evidence and the clarity of the employment relationship. Spanish consulates have similarly tightened scrutiny on NLV cases for third-country residents. The file we would build today is heavier than the one described above.