The industry headlines have been hitting the doomsday bells for the Cyprus Investment Programme (CIP). There were the revocations, the Low case file, the fall in demand for Cypriot real estate. So, we asked those who have their boots on the ground – what the situation really was like and gained valuable insight on the changing ‘landscape’ in Cyprus.
The Cyprus citizenship program sunsetting
It would seem there’s been a lot of negative press on the Cyprus Investment Programme (CIP) over the last quarter of this year. If it wasn’t the passport revocations or the Low case it was the reported fall in foreign investor’s demand for real estate in Cyprus. To top this off early November In-Cyprus reported that with the CIP caps now reached for 2019 and 2020 that in 2021 there had been talks of the programme being suspended, though this proposal was then discarded.
We reached out to a few local investment migration experts to find out more. We were informed that whilst the 2019 cap is reached and 2020 likely too the Cypriot government, in an effort to further strengthen its due diligence, is undertaking a thorough review of all applications. A Cypriot investment migration consultant who preferred to remain anonymous informed that “of these back-logged applications, a percentage will likely not meet the criteria opening up ‘seats’ for other applicants”.
Ms Christina Aristodimou Papadopoulos of Aristo Developers, one of the leading real estate developers on the island informed us that based on their experience they anticipate a change in the real estate market.
“We don t see any risk or believe that the program will be terminated in 2021 or the near future. The program has directly injected more than 6.5 bln euros to the Economy so far not to mention the indirect input.”
Read more: Grey Clouds Over Cyprus Or A Silver Lining?
Sold Out? Cyprus Citizenship
Limassol high-rises have reportedly reached, and in certain cases exceeded their peak price, but in Paphos demand has been soaring for real estate projects.
Therefore, we anticipate that whilst Cyprus failed to closely scrutinize a few (less than 1% of all CIP approved investors) cases in the earlier years of its programme, they have likely learnt their lesson. We expect that they will continue scrutinizing their pipeline of applicants to avoid any major fallout from errors and omissions in their screening process.
This will certainly cause longer wait times. Moreover, as applicant caps are being met and exceeded this will further elongate wait times. But – if we look across at the EB5 programme – with preposterous wait times well over a decade, the Chinese have still continued to make up the largest market for EB5s.
Whilst the afore-mentioned reasons may lengthen investors’ application times, it is unlikely that demand for one of Europe’s most coveted investment programmes will be drying up just yet.
