Mauritius · Residency by investment
Residence Permit by Acquisition of Residential Property
Open at USD 375,000, but the economics changed sharply on 1 July 2026: registration duty and land transfer tax on transfers of scheme property to non-citizens both doubled from 5% to 10%, with no grandfathering for reservations signed earlier. Separately, the G+2 route on State Land and Pas Géométriques has been closed to non-citizens as of 19 June 2026.
The simplest way into Mauritian residence — buy a villa, get a permit, no turnover tests, no physical presence. But the 1 July 2026 doubling of transfer duty turned a 6% entry cost into a 12% one, and with a further 10% land transfer tax on the way out the round-trip friction now approaches 20%. That is a five-to-seven-year hold before the property route breaks even against renting.
Qualifying routes
the main current scheme; replaced IRS and RES for new developments
threshold cut from USD 500,000 to align with PDS
legacy schemes; resale stock only — no new IRS/RES developments
hotel-room units; weakest resale liquidity of the schemes
The facts
- Minimum investment
- $375k
- Total landed cost
- USD 375k minimum purchase plus roughly 11.5-12.5% in one-off costs at the new 10% duty rate — registration duty 10%, notary fees around 1.15% including VAT, EDB scheme processing fee of MUR 10,000-25,000, and a residence permit fee of about MUR 25,000. On a USD 500k villa that is roughly USD 58-63k of friction on the way in.
- Timeline
- 2–6 months — permit follows the notarised deed; the property search and construction schedule dominate
- Physical presence
- None. The permit runs for as long as the property is owned — sell the property and the residence ends.
- Family
- spouse or common-law partnerdependent childrendependent parents
- Permanent residency
- The permit is open-ended while the property is held, but it is not a Permanent Residence Permit; a separate 20-year PRP application is required and property ownership alone does not satisfy it
- Citizenship
- Naturalisation after 7 years' residence, or 2 years at ministerial discretion where at least USD 500,000 is invested — a USD 500k+ scheme property can qualify
- Language test
- adequate knowledge of English or another language current in Mauritius
- Dual citizenship
- Not permitted — you would have to renounce
- Requirements
- purchase of at least USD 375,000 in an EDB-approved schemefunds transferred through the Mauritian banking systemclean criminal recordnotarised deed of saleEDB scheme approval
- Registration duty and land transfer tax both doubled to 10% for transfers to non-citizens from 1 July 2026, and the increase applies by deed date — reservations signed in 2025 that complete after 1 July 2026 pay the new rate with no grandfathering.
- Round-trip transaction friction is now roughly 20% of value. Mauritian scheme property is not a liquid asset and the resale market is thin, dominated by the same developers still selling new stock.
- The USD 375,000 route for acquisition outside EDB schemes has been eliminated — non-citizens can now only buy through IRS/RES/PDS/SCS/IHS or qualifying G+2, and the G+2 State Land route closed to foreigners on 19 June 2026 with a 10% levy on vendors.
- Residence dies with the asset. Sell the villa and the family loses status — this is a leasehold on your immigration position, not a permanent right.
- Buying does not confer the right to work; you still need an Occupation Permit to take employment or run a local trading business.
- USD 375k of Mauritian property is a concentrated, illiquid, single-jurisdiction real-asset bet on a small island economy with 87.8% public debt to GDP.