Hungary:a ten-year permit for a fund subscription

Who this suits

Hungary's Guest Investor Programme suits a reader who wants the longest permit available for the smallest mainstream sum, has no interest in a passport, and is comfortable holding units in a fund rather than a house or a company. €250,000 buys a 10-year permit, renewable once for another 10, with no minimum stay.[1] It does not suit anyone whose goal is citizenship, anyone who wants to own the property directly, or anyone bringing parents, who are not among the family admitted.

What you invest

Act XC of 2023 sets two open routes.[1] The fund route is €250,000 in units of a real-estate fund approved by the Hungarian authorities, with at least 40% of the fund invested in Hungarian residential property, held for 5 years. The donation route is €1 million to a public-interest trust supporting higher education, and it is not returned. A third route, the direct purchase of residential property for €500,000, was removed on 15 January 2025 and no longer exists.[1]

The fund route is the reason Hungary sits in the cheapest band of the matrix: it is the only €250,000 route among the open programmes that is neither a donation nor tied to a specific kind of company.

What you get

A residence permit valid for 10 years, renewable once for a further 10, with no days-of-presence requirement.[1] The family admitted is a spouse and dependent children. The dataset behind this site records no permanent-residence step and no citizenship route attached to this permit; the programme is, on its own terms, a long residence permit and nothing more.[1]

What it costs beyond the investment

No government fee for this programme is carried in the dataset behind this site, because the National Directorate-General for Aliens Policing publishes no consolidated English schedule and the secondary sources do not agree on a figure. Fund subscription and management fees vary by fund and are set by the fund, not by the state. Ask the fund manager and the Directorate for written figures before you commit.[1]

What people get wrong

The €500,000 property purchase still appears on many pages; it closed on 15 January 2025 and the fund and donation routes are what remain.[1] The fund holds Hungarian residential property, but the investor holds units, not a home, so there is nothing to live in and no title deed. A second error is to read the 10-year permit as a form of permanent residence; it is temporary, renewed once, and then ends unless the rules change. A third is to assume that a long residence permit in an EU state leads to an EU passport. Hungary's programme states no citizenship route, and the matrix on the homepage dims it as soon as a reader asks for one.[1]

The one source for Hungary on this site is a note by the International Bar Association, because the authority publishes no consolidated English page; the dataset marks Hungary as resting on secondary sources that agree with each other.