Something Different

This and that...

It has been a hectic week … moving into a house that is 95% done. So, I am taking the liberty of publishing something a little different. It is a bit of this and a bit of that…

Now that I have your attention…Denise was in Sevilla last month. Photo courtesy of Veronica, an American Expat in Portugal.

This … 3 Items in the Portuguese News

Permit me to highlight three Portuguese news items that you should know.

• First, for those that are living in Portugal as temporary residents and need to renew their resident permit...GOOD NEWS! SEF’s automatic renewal feature is now open! My resident permit expired on 30 July and Denise’s on 2 August. We had tried for over a month to access the SEF auto-renewal feature in the “Personal Area” of the website. Each time, after entering the required data we were informed we were not eligible for auto-renewal. I contacted the relocation company we had used and was told not to worry…just keep trying. I am not sure of the exact date, but around 20 July things started working.¹ After entering the required data, including our new address, I was informed that we would receive an email and needed to make a payment. However, one must wait 48 hours before making the payment and complete the transaction within 8 days. Weird? Yes…but it worked! Or at least I think it worked. I recently spoke to friends in Tavira that accessed the SEF system again only to find their application “canceled”. I immediately checked ours and it says “pending payment” (which we had already made). I spoke again to our relocation company, and their advice was to wait. SEF is aware of the “glitch” and is working to resolve the issue. Stay tuned….²

• Second, a news item about Lisbon over the past week which if you are not living in Portugal you likely missed. It seems Pope Francis chose Lisbon as the host for World Youth Day which occurred last week. It is estimated that this event will cost the municipality and the church €155 million. In addition to the financial cost, there appears to have been a real cost to guests and residents of the city. Fellow Substackers Amy and Scott, tell you all about it in their article Screaming Hordes Invade Lisbon.³ And for another take on the Pope’s visit, read this post.

• And if you are considering living in Portugal and thinking about real estate an interesting new statistic I found in The Portugal News. (I will be the first to admit that my predictions of a correction in the Portuguese real estate market have not materialized. Of course, I was not alone in my concern.) But this new study by ECO stopped me in my tracks. It showed that in 2020 a Portuguese buyer (putting 20% down) would have a monthly mortgage payment equivalent to 1/5th of the household income⁴. This seems like a pretty reasonable ratio to me. However, the same house, acquired under the same terms, in the first quarter of 2023 would require 38% of the household income. I realize I am financially conservative…but yikes!

That … Survey Thing

I first asked readers to complete a survey in May 2021…I had just published my 100th post. My second survey was in November 2021 after publishing my 200th post. According to Substack, I now have published 348 posts and I am just shy of 3000 subscribers. Both of these numbers amaze me! So it seems it is a good time to once again ask for your feedback.

This time the survey is less than 10 questions, most of which are multiple choice. As always, I will share the feedback with you in future posts.

So if you would be so kind, as to spend just a few minutes answering this reader survey. If you have not already clicked one of the three links above, you can find it here.

Muito obrigada, beijinhos, tchau

Nanc

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1. That is, it is open if your resident permit expires on or before 30 September 2023.

2. UPDATE 14 August 2023: I checked the SEF website last night and found that our Automatic Residency Renewal was approved…the website actually reports '‘Completed”. It also shows the updated address so I can only hope that the cards are in the mail.

3. I know how it feels when Algarve’s population swells by 50% in August, I can’t imagine what a 300% increase feels like.

4. Assumes a 30-year mortgage indexed to the 12-month Euribor rate (i.e. it is an adjustable-rate mortgage).