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Antigua and Barbuda: A Caribbean Country that Can Become Your Second Home

Explore the transformative potential of acquiring citizenship in Antigua and Barbuda through investment. Gain visa-free access to over 130 countries and secure citizenship for your entire family.

Five countries in the Caribbean offer citizenship-by-investment opportunities and Antigua and Barbuda is one of them. Acquiring citizenship of Antigua and Barbuda in exchange for an investment can change your life. Antiguan passport holders can visit more than 130 countries without visas (or obtain visas on arrival). Besides, all members of your family can become Antiguan citizens and your children can pass the status on to your grandchildren.

At the same time, becoming a full-fledged citizen of a foreign country is not a simple task. First and foremost, you have to make a considerable investment if you would like to ‘buy’ citizenship of Antigua and Barbuda. Second, only trustworthy and law-abiding individuals are welcome to apply for citizenship of the country. You have to prove that you have no criminal past and that your money comes from legal sources exclusively when you file an application for citizenship. Third, the application process is time-consuming: you cannot obtain an Antiguan passport in a week or so. The application processing takes several months and the exact timeframe will depend on several factors.

Advantages that an Antiguan passport brings

Acquiring a passport of Antigua and Barbuda can bring several important advantages. Moreover, it can change your life!

First of all, Antigua and Barbuda is a relatively inexpensive Caribbean country. The average wage there is between 3,000 and 3,500 XCD per month, which is a bit more than a thousand US dollars. The minimum wage is 9 XCD per hour. The prices are considerably lower in comparison to Barbados, for example. A one-bedroom apartment outside the city center will cost you less than US$ 400 per month to rent. Life is as beautiful in Antigua and Barbuda as it is on any other Caribbean island, yet it’s more affordable compared to some other countries in the region.

Second, you can freely travel around the globe with an Antiguan passport. What is more, you can use it to open bank accounts in foreign countries and to participate in international investment projects.

Third, you can acquire citizenship of Antigua and Barbuda for all members of your family including your spouse, children, parents, and unmarried siblings. Antigua and Barbuda has a fantastic offer for large families applying for its citizenship (see below). Besides, Antiguan citizenship is inheritable.

Finally, you can find numerous business and investment opportunities in Antigua and Barbuda. The country is actively developing and its economy is growing. In 2024, its GDP per capita has grown by more than 15% in comparison to the previous year. This is an impressive figure indeed. Please visit the InternationalWealth.Info web portal to learn much more about the economy of Antigua and Barbuda.

How you can acquire citizenship of Antigua and Barbuda by investment

You have to realize that all countries administering citizenship-by-investment programs are under pressure from the global regulating authorities and Antigua and Barbuda is not an exception. Holders of Antiguan passports have visa-free access to the Schengen zone and the EU authorities certainly don’t want suspicious individuals to enter the territory of the Union without visas.

For this reason, all applicants for Antiguan citizenship have to go through stringent security checks. If you are unable to supply a clean police record, you cannot obtain citizenship of Antigua and Barbuda by investment. If you are unable to prove that your money comes from a legal source, you cannot obtain citizenship of the country again. If the Antiguan immigration authorities suspect that you might potentially pose threats to the county’s international reputation, they will reject your application for citizenship. Because the due diligence procedures are quite profound, they naturally take a considerable amount of time.  

Economic citizenship of Antigua and Barbuda: the investment options

The second essential requirement that you have to meet to qualify for Antiguan citizenship is making an investment in the country’s economy. Antigua and Barbuda offers several financial paths to its citizenship and we will start with the most affordable ones.

You can donate US$ 100,000 to the National Development Fund to qualify for citizenship of Antigua and Barbuda. We have to note at this point, however, that four of the five Caribbean countries administering citizenship-by-investment programs have agreed to raise the lower threshold to at least US$ 200,000 very soon. In all likelihood, the minimum required donation amount is going to grow in the near future.

Now we would like to point out the fantastic offer that we have mentioned above even though it also may become unavailable soon. If you donate US$ 150,000 to the University of the West Indies Fund, you can obtain passports for six members of your family. Interestingly, families with a smaller number of members are not eligible to use this option.

If you do your math, you will see that a passport of Antigua and Barbuda can cost only US$ 25,000 if your family is large enough. Nowhere else in the world could you ‘buy’ a passport for twenty-five thousand dollars.

You can also qualify for citizenship of Antigua and Barbuda if you make a returnable investment instead of a non-returnable donation. Buy a house or an apartment in the country for at least US$ 400,000 and you will qualify for citizenship.

There is an interesting subtype of this option. If two people buy a house for US$ 400,000 each of them contributing US$ 200,000, they will both qualify for citizenship of Antigua and Barbuda. 

You can also invest in a Government-approved business venture to become eligible for citizenship of the country. The required investment amount is US$ 1,500,000 in this case.

Again, there is a subtype of this option. You can also make a joint investment into business under the following conditions:

  • The total amount of investment has to be at least US$ 5,000,000;
  • The smallest number of investors is two;
  • The lowest amount of investment that an individual investor can make is US$ 400,000.

These are the investment options that Antigua and Barbuda offers. You have to realize, however, that additional costs are going to be involved in the process of acquiring Antiguan citizenship. In particular, you will have to cover the costs of the security checks and pay an application processing fee. Passport issuance fees are also payable but they are negligible in comparison to other fees.

A checklist for those considering applying for citizenship of Antigua and Barbuda

Obtaining a second passport is a demanding task and we would like to make a few important suggestions to finish this article:

  • Find out about alternative citizenship-by-investment programs: there are several of them.
  • Make sure you find professional support in the process of applying for foreign citizenship.
  • Be prepared to wait: application processing takes time.
  • Be prepared to pay: acquiring foreign citizenship takes money.
  • Find out about the new obligations that you would get if you acquired second citizenship.