New Zealand · Residency by investment
Active Investor Plus Visa
Rebuilt from 1 April 2025 into two categories (Growth and Balanced). The English language requirement was removed outright and the presence requirement cut. Further loosened since: from February 2026 offshore AIP holders may buy or build one NZ home valued at NZD 5 million or more, and from 1 June 2026 Growth applicants may direct up to 20% of the investment to qualifying philanthropy.
This is the most successful repricing of an investor visa anywhere in the last decade: 734 applications for 2,390 people in the first 14 months against 116 applications in two and a half years under the old settings. But the visa and the passport are two different products — the visa asks for 21 days, the passport asks for 1,350, and the gap is where most families' plans quietly fail.
Qualifying routes
36-month hold; higher-risk assets only — managed funds and direct investment into NZ businesses; up to 20% may go to qualifying philanthropy from 1 June 2026
60-month hold; wider menu including bonds, listed equities, and new residential/commercial/industrial development
The facts
- Minimum investment
- 5M NZD
- Total landed cost
- NZD 5m (Growth) or NZD 10m (Balanced) of at-risk capital, plus INZ application fees from about NZD 27,470 covering the principal applicant and immediate family, before legal, migration-adviser and fund-manager costs
- Timeline
- 6–15 months — INZ reports an average of 36 working days to approve once investment evidence is filed — but that clock starts only after approval in principle, and applicants then have 6 months (extendable by 6) to deploy the capital
- Physical presence
- Growth: 21 days in New Zealand across the 36-month investment period. Balanced: 105 days across 60 months, reduced by 14 days for each additional NZD 1m placed in Growth-category assets, to a floor of 63 days.
- Family
- partner (genuine and stable relationship)dependent children aged 24 and under
- Permanent residency
- Resident visa is granted up front; Permanent Resident Visa follows once the investment and presence conditions are met — 36 months (Growth) or 60 months (Balanced)
- Citizenship
- 5 years as a resident, but citizenship by grant separately demands 1,350 days physically present in NZ including at least 240 days in each of those 5 years
- Language test
- No language test for the visa since April 2025. Citizenship by grant still requires the applicant to understand and speak English, and from mid-2027 most adult applicants will additionally sit a formal citizenship test.
- Dual citizenship
- Permitted
- Requirements
- NZD 5m (Growth) or NZD 10m (Balanced) in acceptable investments, transferred through the banking systemfunds must be lawfully earned and evidence of source of funds and wealth is examinedinvestment must be made within 6 months of approval in principle (one 6-month extension possible)meet health and character requirementsno English language requirementno age limit
- The 21-day Growth presence rule buys residency, not citizenship. NZ citizenship needs 1,350 days including 240 days in every one of five years. Anyone marketing AIP as a passport route is eliding a two-orders-of-magnitude difference.
- Approval in principle is not a resident visa. As at 24 May 2026, 734 applications had been lodged, 299 approved in principle and only 294 actually approved — roughly 40%. The rest are in progress or deploying capital.
- The FIF regime is the real cost of living here and it starts the day the transitional exemption ends. See the transitional-residency entry — this is the single most under-disclosed feature of the programme.
- Growth category capital is genuinely at risk. It cannot sit in bonds or listed equities; it must go into managed funds or direct NZ business investment. Loss of capital does not void the visa conditions, but it does mean loss of capital.
- Only 122 of 734 applications chose Balanced. At NZD 10m for a lower-risk menu it is being ignored by the market, which is a signal about pricing rather than about risk appetite.
- Six months to deploy from approval in principle is tight for NZD 5m into illiquid private assets; an extension exists but is not automatic.
- The residential property concession is narrow — one home, NZD 5m minimum, and it does not repeal the wider Overseas Investment Act regime on sensitive land.
- Policy has now moved three times in four years (Investor 1/2 closed 2022, AIP 2022, AIP rebuilt 2025, tweaked twice in 2026). Settings this fluid can move again.