Three things people confuse
The permit lets you stay. Tax residency decides who taxes you. The house is only an asset — unless the permit requires it.
Not legal, tax or immigration advice. Confirm every figure on Govern.ad and the BOPA before you transfer money or file.
If you take one thing from this site, take this. Andorra runs three systems that share a vocabulary and do not share rules. People who collapse them into “moving to Andorra” are the people who later discover they still have a tax home in Spain.
1. The immigration permit
This is the card Immigration issues. It answers: may this person live in Andorra, and may they work. The main private routes in 2026 are residence without work (passive / no lucrative activity) and residence with work, including self-employment through an Andorran company. There are also employee permits, family reunion, and a digital-nomad style route. Each has its own days, deposits and prohibitions.
Passive presence is generally 90 days in the calendar year. Self-employed active presence is generally 183 days. Those numbers belong to immigration. They are not a tax opinion.
2. Tax residency
Andorran personal income tax (IRPF) treats you as tax resident if you spend more than 183 days in Andorra in the calendar year, counting ordinary absences unless you prove tax residence elsewhere, or if your main centre of economic interests is here. A spouse and minor children habitually living here can also create a presumption. That is Llei 5/2014, article 8, not the immigration leaflet.
So a passive permit that only requires 90 days does not make you an Andorran tax resident by itself. If you still live most of the year in Spain or France, keep the house, the school run and the business there, those countries can still claim you. Andorra has information-exchange and double-tax arrangements. It is not a place you disappear to.
The Government’s own FAQ is who is a tax resident. A longer reading of that article is on tax residence.
3. The house
Buying property does not grant a permit. A permit does not force you to buy. Passive residency in 2026 often uses property as part of the one-million-euro investment, with a floor of €800,000 per dwelling, but you can also use other qualifying Andorran assets. Non-residents and residents with under three years’ effective residence pay an extra foreign-investment tax on purchases. Residents of longer standing generally do not. That tax is a purchase cost. It is not a residency application.
Side by side
| Immigration permit | Tax residency | Buying a house | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Question | May I live / work here? | Who taxes my worldwide income? | May I acquire this building, and at what tax? |
| Typical test | 90 or 183 days, investment, AFA sum, clean record | 183 days or centre of interests | Foreign-investment authorisation + ITP ± IIEI |
| Authority | Immigration / AFA | Tax administration (IRPF) | Notary, Tributs, Economy |
| Common error | Assuming the card equals 10% tax | Assuming 90 days is enough | Assuming the deed is the permit |
What the tax actually is, if you are resident
IRPF is 0% on the first €24,000, 5% on the next band to €40,000, and 10% above that. There is no wealth tax and, in the ordinary case, no inheritance tax. Companies pay a 10% headline corporate tax. IGI, the VAT equivalent, is 4.5%. Those figures are why people come. They are not a reason to ignore the 183-day test or a Spanish Hacienda challenge on “centre of vital interests”.
Which route is which
- You will live here most of the year and work or run a company here — active / self-employed. See Company and active residency.
- You can live on assets or foreign income and will not work in Andorra — passive. See Passive residency in 2026. Budget a million in Andorran assets plus the AFA payment, and still plan the tax-residence question separately.
- You want the house as a second home and will not live here — that is a property purchase, not a life plan. See Buying property. You will pay the foreign-investment tax.
Andorra is not in the EU and not in Schengen in the ordinary sense, though border arrangements with the EU have been tightening. Do not sell yourself a “EU golden visa”. The local name is residència sense activitat lucrativa, or residència passiva. People search “Andorra golden visa” because other countries trained them to. The phrase is a useful search term and a bad legal description.
No page on this site should say a 90-day permit equals tax residency. Read tax residence.