Argentine Residency and Citizenship

[Attorney in BA]

However, to those looking for lawyers beware - there are a lot of lawyers who don't know migraciones and you get nothing from them better than if you were doing it yourself. You should ask to see their Migraciones-specific card that proves they have the certification.

El Queso, this is not exactly the case. You can get the migraciones card with just a certificate from the Bar Association (Colegio Publico de Abogados) stating that you are registered and licensed to practice law, and a copy of your DNI. The migraciones card does not mean that the holder has any knowledge of immigration law.

However, I do agree that there are lawyers that have absolutely no knowledge of the law and procedure and offer their services. So yes, as you said, beware.

 

[Attorney in BA]

I am interested in possibly settling permanently in Arg.
what recommendations/anecdots/suggestions/experience do you have for aquiering permanent Residency and ultimately citizenship in Arg.
How did you go about it and how long and hard was the process?
Are there any benefits to citizenship above perm residency?

To be able to apply for citizenship you must first be a permanent resident for at least 2 years. If you do not qualify for permanent residency directly, you would first have to apply for a temporary residency and after 3 years change your status to permanent. You obtain citizenship through a judicial process, in which the judge checks to see if all requirements have been fulfilled. That process may take anywhere from 6 months to 2 years, depending on the court that you get assigned.

Benefits are something that would have to be evaluated in a case-by-case basis and will greatly depend on the passport you currently hold, why you want the citizenship in the first place, etc.

Below is a time line that illustrates the process. If you have any further questions just ask.

 

[steveinbsas]

However, I do agree that there are lawyers that have absolutely no knowledge of the law and procedure and offer their services. So yes, as you said, beware.

My first girlfriend in Argentina insisted that I use her lawyer to apply for my visa.

He didn't know much about immigration law (I quickly discovered), but he agreed with my girlfriend that (as a foreigner) I could only buy an apartment in her name and that I should transfer the funds into an account in his name.

Fortunately, I fired the lawyer, dumped (fled) my girlfriend, and bought the apartment in my own name (only)...

And lived happily ever after...at least so far.

What was it Shakespeare said about lawyers?

(Centuries before Argentina became a nation...)

 

[Attorney in BA]

What was it Shakespeare said about lawyers?

I think that he suggested to kill them (us) all. A solution that, for obvious reasons, I oppose.

This is a much more interesting solution: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1AyGc1r6T1k

 

[ElQueso]

El Queso, this is not exactly the case. You can get the migraciones card with just a certificate from the Bar Association (Colegio Publico de Abogados) stating that you are registered and licensed to practice law, and a copy of your DNI. The migraciones card does not mean that the holder has any knowledge of immigration law.

Thanks Attorney - my misunderstanding on that one.

 

[ElQueso]

I find the idea that it is necessary to "grease" anyone's palm at migraciones appalling, to say the least!

Additionally, I don't understand what something that happened (criminally) 30 years ago could have to do with a visa application being accepted or rejected. I thought the requirement was only to provide "criminal history" for the past five years. It certainly was in my case.

As I understand it, it is up to the whim of the attorney who is assigned to the case as to exactly what he will review on a given criminal history. And what should it have to do with it? Nothing in my opinion, but if they want to, they have the power to "examine" the issue and cause delay.

As my friend found out when she got the FBI criminal history, you don't even know sometimes that you have a criminal history until you see the results. If you had something in your past, it would have shown up on the criminal history from the FBI, unless there is some other type of FBI criminal history that the FBI gives out. I'm talking felonies here - I don't think they bother with misdemeanors, but I'm not sure.

I don't know why, but the FBI gives a person's whole history to the requesting body. In this case, she had a very minor incident which was at the time a felony if convicted (whatever the lowest level is next to a misdemeanor). When sentenced, the judge gave her "deferred adjudication" which means that if she completes the probation period assigned (the only punishment enacted) that the item would be removed from her record - she would be "unconvicted."

For whatever reason, the record was not "expunged" way back when, probably due to some clerical error because my friend says she completed the probation (6 months) successfully. So she was surprised to find that on her record.

As I understand it, the immigration lawyers can choose to ignore the incident, making a statement that it has been a long time, was a minor problem, that there is some kind of law concept where it wouldn't be legal in Argentina to provide the history going that far back and therefore it shouldn't even be looked at even though the person involved isn't a citizen, etc.

If they don't ignore it, they could cause the approval of the residency to be delayed for a long time, possibly a year or two.

We'll see what the outcome of that is. Her lawyer said that it wasn't automatic that they would delay, but likely. Her application was made a few weeks ago and hasn't yet cleared the first level of review.

 

[ULDB65]

Lots of good advice on the process of getting residency and citizenship, but not so much on WHY someone would want citizenship here.

As best as I can figure, there is no advantage to having Argentine citizenship.

I would love to hear some other opinions on this, though...

 

[ElQueso]

Citizenship doesn't necessarily follow residency.

I don't plan on getting citizenship here - for now. However, to have more than one passport could be a neat thing depending on what you want it for. For that, I will leave it up to your imagination (I'm not talking illegal things necessarily).

Residency is a different story. If one wants to live here, best that one be legal in these days as things change with the government and their lenient policies related to perma-tourists. I've been here for three years and am just now getting residency. I didn't have a lot pushing me until now, but every week I feel more and more exposed as the government tightens up on things.

 

[extranjero]

I think, one can apply for Argentine citizenship after 2 years of temporal any legal residency, including temporal.

 

[trey]

hi guys. I started the application for my residency (as a Rentista) last year. I decided to do this after 4 years of living here because they were starting to get difficult in Buquebus when I left every 3 months to renew my tourist visa. However, having said that, I think things are getting worse everywhere. I recently flew from Zurich to London with British Airways and they asked me a ton of questions about why I was going to London and when I said I was infact just flying through to get to BsAs, they asked to see some evidence of my residency here! Thankfully, I had the residency paper with me, though it's the only time I've needed it since I got it...
I did the residency application via a lawyer because I'd heard horror stories about people being sent away at Migraciones because of minor differences in spelling in their documents etc. Within a couple of months I had the temporary 1 year residency and a month later the DNI. The lawyer I used was very professional, and when i did indeed have a problem with my middle name appearing on some docs and not others, he advised me as to how to resolve it. I would absolutely recommend him for those of you who don't want to go through the painful process of the queues and the waiting between appointments: his name is Gabriel Celano and his cell is 15 4400 9278. I can't say that it was cheap, because I don't think it was, but then I've no idea what other lawyers charge for the residency /DNI combi. To be honest, I don't know what good the DNI is to me, since I'm not looking to get loans or a cell phone contract, but it came as part of the process.