Unlocking Travel with Residence by Investment feat. Dominic Volek

Hello, future billionaires. Welcome back to another episode of the Invest Like a Billionaire podcast. Today's guest I brought on is Dominic Volek, and very, very cool topic. This is residence by investment. So if you have a travel bug, if you like to travel, if you want to, in this interview he talks about how a plan B, right, to have residence in a different country. There's a myriad of programs available that you can actually invest into these different countries in a whole range of options from as low as $20,000 all the way up to a million plus. $1 million and get access to these countries with pretty cool benefits. So Dominic is an expert in this. The firm he represents is the leading global firm in this area and very, very cool stuff. I was really unaware of most of the options available. And so definitely encourage you to check it out if you have any interest in different countries you can travel to and have residence. He talks about how you can use this in your legacy planning. And then at the end talks about the EB-5 program, which is investment visa into the US for those that are foreigners and want to come to the US and have more access to So just lots of cool options. So definitely check it out. And if you're enjoying the show, always appreciate you leaving a review, a rating on any platform that you're listening to this on, and share with a friend and help us get the word out. Thanks so much. This is the Invest Like a Billionaire podcast where we uncover the alternative investments and strategies that billionaires use to grow wealth. The tools and tactics you'll learn from this podcast will make you a better investor and help you build legacy wealth. Join us as we dive into the world of alternative investments, uncover strategies of the ultra-wealthy, discuss economics, and interview successful investors. Looking for passive investments done for you? With Aspen Funds, we help accredited investors that are looking for higher yields and diversification from the stock market. As a passive investor, we do all the work for you, making sure your money is working hard for you in alternative investments. In fact, our team invests alongside you in every deal so our interests are aligned. We focus on macro-driven alternative investments so your portfolio is best positioned for this economic environment. Get started and download your free economic report today. Hello, welcome back to another episode of the Invest Like a Billionaire podcast. I am your host Ben Frazier, and joined today by Dominic Bullock, He is the group head of private clients at Henley Partners and very excited for this interview. You're going to get the inside scoop on— you're going to correct me on the exact title, but how to get residency in different countries by investment. And so Henley Partners is the global leader in this. This is a space that has evolved over time and has, you know, really created some pretty cool things to do as a high net worth individual. And so, Dominic, welcome to the show. Really excited to have you.

Thanks, Finn, and appreciate the opportunity.

Yes. So you're actually currently in Dubai, and so we had to find a time that worked for both of us here, but very, very cool. And share a little bit of your background, kind of how you kind of came to the role that you're in right now, and then share a little bit about Henley Partners and what you guys do.

Yeah, perfect. So I originally, I am a chartered accountant by qualification. So I grew up in South Africa and then made my way through one of the Big Four tax and accounting firms in Johannesburg. I had a small stint in the US with them and that ultimately took me to Singapore. I was based out of Singapore for about 6 and a half years and it was during that time that I came across Henley Partners. And to be honest, like, I think probably some of your listeners, the, the whole concept of, you know, the ability for wealthy individuals to acquire citizenship or residence by investment around the world was also quite new to me at that time. But it was a very interesting opportunity. And, and, and part of that was to really expand our operations in the Asia Pacific area. And so that's what I spent the first 4 or 5 years doing with, with Henley Partners. And then subsequently moved into a much larger global role where I head up our private client practice. So, so we have over 45 offices around the world now, and I pretty much spend my time across our major offices in all the sort of big financial centers, which is where most of our clients come to us. So that's everything from the Americas, you know, London, Europe, Africa, here in the Middle East where I'm currently. All the way through to, to Singapore and Hong Kong. And so I specialize on advising these high net worth individuals with all the different options that are available. So there's about 40-odd countries where you can acquire citizenship and residence by investment if you have the financial capacity. And of course, that you pass, you know, each government's due diligence checks. And this is a phenomenon now that is really, you know, global, not just for emerging markets, but also very much for first world countries as well.

Yeah, so, so cool. So break down a little bit of what you mean by acquire residence by investment. I mean, for someone that likes to travel or wants to have that kind of dual citizenship or just some of the cool benefits of this, you talk about what that actually means and talk about what it is now, but then talk about how it's kind of evolved over time. I think that's pretty interesting as well.

Yeah, so the industry is known as investment migration and there's really two sides to it. Are those countries that offer direct to citizenship by investment without the need to physically relocate or learn a new language. And then there's those countries that offer residence by investment. And so the principle behind residence by investment is I invest into a country and in return I get rights or the right to reside in that country. These are often known often called Golden Visas as well, very popular in places like Portugal and Spain and Greece and Italy. There's a lot more countries that offer residence by investment, and at the moment, probably only 10 countries where you can acquire citizenship through a government-regulated TBI program, as we refer to them. In terms of what's happened over the last sort of 5 to 10 years, If we look at, you know, those countries offering citizenship by investment, the real attraction there next to the citizenship is I have the right to get a passport of that country. And historically, the industry has largely been driven by the emerging markets. So places like China and the Philippines, India, South Africa, where, you know, you're born in a country where your passport is not very good from a travel perspective. So You know, if you're an American and you want to go on holiday, you pretty much worry about the plane ticket. You don't have to worry about whether I actually have a need of visa to enter that country. But there's a huge part of the world like those, some of those countries I mentioned where that's the first thing I think about, right? If my family and I want to go on holiday somewhere, the first thing we think about is, you know, how do we get— do we need a visa? What does that cost and what's the process? We, we spent the last 18 months, just as an example, quite aggressively expanding our presence in the US. And as part of my role there, I of course need to travel to the US to do that. And from Dubai, it took me about 10 or 11 months just to get my visa on my South African passport to be able to travel to the US. So it's quite a restrictive thing. Exactly. So it's quite a restrictive thing, right? So if I'm a successful international businessman, entrepreneur, and I need to travel to lots of countries on short-term notice, it's not that easy if you're from certain countries. And so that's where the demand for the industry originally came from, was those nations that had passports that didn't have great travel freedom, that were interested in acquiring a second passport or citizenship that gave them visa-free access to Europe, to UK, to Singapore and other, and other jurisdictions. So that's what started the industry. But we've seen quite a shift now, um, probably most notably since COVID where this is now, you know, the topic at the forefront of wealthy individuals' minds, even in the emerging, even in the developed markets. So the US, as an example, is now our single biggest market for new clients. And so that's been sort of quite a shift in the industry because You know, Americans live in a great country. They have a very good passport from a travel perspective. It's in the top 10 globally from a visa-free travel. But they still realize the benefit of having a second citizenship, a plan B, or an insurance policy as we see it. And as these geopolitical events have happened around the world, whether it's Brexit for you, you know, for Brits, the Russia-Ukraine conflict in Europe for Europeans, more and more individuals that are, you know, a bit more savvy in terms of their risk mitigation are looking at having alternative residence and citizenship around the world in order to better protect themselves and their family.

Yeah. Yeah, it makes sense. So in the US, obviously we're very privileged in our ability to travel freely, but this offers kind of another level of freedom to, like you said, have a plan B. There's also benefits, I'm sure too, right? If you want to acquire a residence in another country to get financing or other forms of capital, it can be difficult if you're not a citizen. Is that accurate? Or what are some other things that it creates a benefit for?

Yeah, yeah, very true. So if we look at the pandemic, what happened in the pandemic and where particularly our business in the US took off was in that initial lockdown period, Europe said, if you're an American, you cannot enter Europe. And so it didn't matter if you were a billionaire and you had, you know, a number of private jets at your disposal, you were not allowed to enter Europe. But if you had a Golden Visa from Portugal or citizenship in Malta, you could still enter. And so I think that fragility, I think that made people feel a bit more exposed, especially in the US. Um, and if you look at how wealthy people generally think, they like to diversify, right? So if I'm wealthy, I don't have all my investments in one asset class. I have bonds, I have real estate, I have equities. Nowadays I have, you know, cryptocurrencies and all sorts of other alternative investments. Then it actually makes no sense to have one country of residence and citizenship that I can live in. Why would I limit myself like that when I completely understand the diversification idea in terms of my assets, but then I only have one country that I can live in. And that's what I think has, has awoken a lot of the demand, especially in the US. And then in terms of other benefits, you know, these individuals also do buy real estate all over the world. And so why not do it in those countries where with the real estate investment, I also get residence of that country. And so I think it's quite a clever way to expand your portfolio on the asset side and at the same time develop a portfolio of domiciles, of residence and citizenship around the world.

Yeah. Yeah. Very, very interesting. So I'd be thinking, oh man, I'm sure the barrier to entry is extremely high and I gotta be, you know, ultra, ultra high net worth. And you know, there is a barrier to entry, you know, obviously, but talk a little bit about some of the range, right? 'Cause there's a range of, kind of entry points for different countries and different types of, like, Schengen visas versus residency, other things. So kind of break down some of the optionality available to individuals.

Yeah. So one of the good things is there are a lot of options. So if you look globally, there's actually about 100 countries that have some form of legislation or regulation in place that allows for investment migration. And in reality, as I said at the start, there's about 40 countries that have attractive, successful programs in which we assist our clients. And that does come at quite a range, you know. So you have options in Thailand as an example that starts at about $20,000 for, for long-term residence in Thailand, all the way up to citizenship in Europe that can come in at about €1 million. So there is quite a large spectrum of affordability depending on, you know, an individual's net worth and appetite. We generally say our clients, as a sort of very broad benchmark, wouldn't invest more than sort of 20% of their net worth in order to participate in one of these programmes. A lot of our clients, the vast majority of them, don't physically move. So this is probably one of the misconceptions about you know, the work that we do is that it's not actually about relocation. It's about having the option to relocate if I want to or if I need to. So the vast majority of clients don't relocate. However, those that do and, you know, you know, historically there's been a significant inflow from China, Vietnam, India that participate in the US EB-5 program. And so they come into the US. There sometimes they would invest, you know, significantly more of their net worth in order to make that move. But in most cases, it is an investment that I should get a return on and ultimately recoup my capital. You know, the programs are different as well. So it's not always a sunk cost, although sometimes it does consist of a nonrefundable contribution in order to get that residence or citizenship.

Right. So the range again is on the low end, What was the number you said up to? You said a million?

Yeah, probably, you know, in Southeast Asia, if you're looking for residence in Malaysia or Thailand, you can probably get in anywhere between sort of $20,000 to $100,000. If I look at the US particularly, the most popular options for our families that we assist in the US is usually citizenship in the Caribbean. So in the Caribbean, you have 5 of these independent Commonwealth countries that offer citizenship by investment. You can either donate anywhere from $100,000 to $200,000, or you can invest into real estate anywhere from $200,000 to $400,000. And in return, within about a 6-month processing time, you become a citizen of that country and you get, and you get access to their passports. And these passports are very good travel documents, visa-free access to the whole of the European Schengen area to the UK in most cases, and, and about on average about 140, 150 countries around the world. Now, that's not as strong as a US passport, but we do also have clients that travel to certain parts of the world where they prefer to travel on a more politically benign passport. And so entering as a citizen of Grenada or Antigua and Barbuda might be a bit easier than going into certain countries where you know, for whatever political reasons, maybe Americans are not, are not, not always that, that favorably looked upon. So there's that element to it as well. So that's the Caribbean. For a lot of American high net worth individuals, Europe, of course, is very much at the top of the list as well. So there you have Portugal, which has been probably the most popular program over the last few years. That's a Golden Visa. It's a residence in Portugal. And after 5 years of just spending very little time in Portugal and learning a basic language, you can also apply for citizenship in Portugal. There your entry level is about €250,000 up to about €500,000 depending on what you're investing your money into. Spain is €500,000 into real estate. Greece starts at €250,000 into real estate. So these are very popular destinations in the US. And then I would say the sort of top shelf of what's available, and this is only really for, you know, ultra-high net worth, $30, $50 million net worth plus, and, you know, centi-millionaires, and we have a few billionaires. They look at things like Malta and Austria. So both of these countries are members of the European Union. They have incredibly strong passports from a travel perspective. But the real attraction is because they are EU members, you have complete settlement rights across the 27 EU member states as well as Switzerland. So right now, as an American passport holder, I can travel to Europe for 90 days every 180 days, and I can go in for holiday or for business meetings, but I have to leave. If I have a Malta or an Austria citizenship, I can go and live anywhere in Europe. My kids can go and study anywhere in Europe. I can work, I can buy properties, run businesses. And that's the real sort of flexibility that these ultra-high net worths are after.

Yeah, very interesting. So going back to one of the earlier comments you said, obviously, you know, we have a lot of freedoms as, you know, US citizens to travel, but there are still restrictions. And then during the COVID lockdowns, there was, even more restrictions where if you weren't a citizen, you couldn't travel into some of these countries. I'm assuming that even during the lockdowns, other things, if you had either a Golden Visa or the citizenship, they didn't change their minds and said, actually, no, that's kind of a lower tier. You still had the freedoms that you expected. Was that kind of the—

Correct. What happened? Yeah, you have all the rights of a citizen or normal resident of that country. So there's no distinction between sort of an investor applicant versus a normal citizen. So you're a full citizen, you even have the right to vote. And of course, the real benefit, if you look at Europe, if you have citizenship of a place like Malta, and this now comes into particularly for ultra-high net worths into their sort of legacy planning, is that citizenship, while it might be a big investment for me now, it's a— it will have a generational impact because that citizenship can then be handed down by descent to future generations. So the conversation that I have with a lot of clients in the US is if you're, you know, if you have $100 million, you know, to your name, what is more valuable to give your children when you move on one day? Is it another million dollars in the bank? Is it another million dollars in real estate somewhere? Or the fact that I have invested that million into Europe and in return become a citizen and now this is now you know, handed down from generation to generation where you have the settlement rights across another 28 countries in Europe next to the ability to live and, you know, have my life in the US. And that's the real optionality that the sort of top-tier clients are after.

Very, very cool. You mentioned the investment, right? Sometimes it can be a sunk cost. Sometimes it can be investment into real estate. Can you talk about what that kind of looks like? I know there's probably a very broad array of options, but, you know, specifically the one, the options where it's actually an investment. What does that investment look like? Is it into some kind of government-funded, you know, trust or fund or index? Or is it, can you just purchase a rental property or some other kind of secondary residence directly? You know, what does that usually look like from a, what does the investment entail?

Yeah, so it differs country by country. You know, these are, these are heavily sort of regulated programs within the country. There's typically a Citizenship by Investment Act behind it, or very specific regulations and rules that the government has around what you can invest into, how long you need to maintain that investment. So each country is a little bit different. So if you look at the Caribbean, it's either a donation. So once my citizenship is approved, I'll donate $100,000 to $200,000. That's going into, you know, usually some sort of a sustainability fund, a hurricane relief fund, something that the government then uses to invest back into the country. Or I can buy real estate. And so in the Caribbean, you're typically going to invest into government-approved, you know, sort of 5-star hotel resort projects that then stimulate the tourism economy. So I'll buy a unit in a branded hotel and I'll get a couple of weeks use a year, but otherwise it's part of a functioning hotel resort in the Caribbean. I get a return each year and after 5 years I can then sell, I can exit that investment. So that's the Caribbean. In Europe, it's a little bit different. So in places like Spain and Greece, real estate is usually the preferred route for most clients. So in Spain, I can buy a nice villa, I can keep it as a holiday home. Or I can even invest into commercial properties and earn a rental. I can do the same with residential and Airbnb it or rent it out to get a yield. And so that's, you know, favored by a lot of clients. If you look at a country—

So you have some optionality in that case where you can pick the property you want. It's not into some kind of blind government fund or something.

Correct.

And is it the value of the asset?

Yeah. So in Spain and Greece, you're buying, if you want, a lifestyle property, a holiday home, right? And so either you can keep it for personal use or you can rent it out to whoever you want. So there's really no restrictions in terms of what you actually invest into on the real estate side. In the Caribbean, as I said, they are typically government-approved projects. So each jurisdiction's a little bit different in terms of what you can invest into, you know, for, for the applicants.

Okay. Okay. You mentioned earlier by doing this in most countries, there's not a requirement for how many days of the year you actually have to be physically in the country. Is that the case for pretty much all of these countries? And I mean, that's obviously different than like, you know, if we have residency in the US here in a few different states, obviously certain states have no income tax and there's kind of requirements for, how long you have to be in that state to hit that threshold, you know, but there's, you're saying there's not an actual threshold for most of these countries.

Yeah, it's the case for the majority of, of these investment migration programs. You know, again, the rules can slightly differ, but as a general rule of thumb, there's no physical presence requirements. And if you look at something like Portugal, which is one of the more popular ones, they require you to effectively spend 7 days a year in order to keep your Golden Visa. In Spain and Greece, there's no physical presence requirements, but those are just for residence. If you wanted to, what some clients do, want to eventually apply for citizenship in that country, that then usually requires a bit more physical, physical time and, and usually a language test. So if you look at Spain, you can get the Golden Visa. I can invest €500,000 in real estate, I get the Golden Visa and I have to spend no time there. But if I wanted to get Spanish citizenship, I would have to effectively reside there. So spend about 6 months a year for 10 years before I'm eligible to apply for citizenship. In Greece, the Golden Visa alone does not require me to spend physical time there. But if I wanted to apply for citizenship, eventually the citizenship requirement is that I live in Greece for 5 out of 7 years and I can speak Greek. Which is not the easiest language. So that's the Golden Visas. As I've said, most of our clients, if they're ultra high net worth, Malta is usually the preferred route because there's little physical presence requirements. But I can get citizenship. And of course, once I am a citizen of a country, you know, unless I become completely persona non grata, that's permanent, right? So there's no further requirements of investment. Or physical presence once I become that citizen.

Okay, okay. Um, yeah, so talk a little bit about the difference between Golden Visa and citizenship. Is there some pretty big drawbacks, you know, as with the Golden Visa relative to citizenship, or it's, it's not, you know, significant?

One of the key things with citizenship is I get a passport, right? I have a right to a passport, and so in a number of, for a number of nationalities, the passport is really important because that's my travel document. And with residence or golden visas, I don't, I don't have a passport as part of that option. However, the golden visas in Europe do still give you some mobility benefit because if you're a South African like myself, I need to get a Schengen visa if I want to go to Europe. But if I have a Golden Visa of Spain, Greece, Portugal, Italy, or Latvia, I no longer need a Schengen visa because those countries are within the 27-member Schengen zone. So there is some travel benefits. Citizenship, as I've said, is really a permanent state and not usually subject to any conditions where if you have a Golden Visa or one of these residence by investment programs, that's always tied to some type of condition like maintaining the investment and in some cases spending a bit of time in that country. So, so I would say the majority look at eventually to get citizenship, or if they have the financial capacity, they go direct to citizenship by investment at the start. Okay.

Talk a little bit about tax implications, right? What are the, you know, general ideas you have to be aware of from a tax standpoint? I'm assuming You know, if you're investing into one of these countries in Europe, you probably have to file a tax return in that country for that investment. Does anything else kind of get looped into that or what's kind of the tax implication for these?

So again, it'll depend what you invest into in order to get that residence or citizenship. You know, if you have an income-producing asset like you're getting, you know, you're taking in rent on a property that you own in Spain, you would typically need to pay income tax on your local source income in that country. But just by virtue of acquiring citizenship in the Caribbean or in Europe or holding a Golden Visa, there's no direct tax implications on your existing planning. Of course, for Americans, it's a bit of a different story, right? And so because if you're an American, you're taxed because of your citizenship. It's one of the unique things about the US. Where most of the rest of the world is taxed based on where you physically spend at least 6 months a year. That's where you're tax resident. And, you know, your taxation is usually based on those rules. But if you're an American, it doesn't matter where you live, you'll be paying tax, right? And so one side of our industry that we do also assist with, it's not as common as some people think, but for sure there are some Americans living, you know, usually those that are outside the US who actually look to get an alternative to their American citizenship and then actually go through what is a very complicated and can be a very costly process of actually expatriating and renouncing their US citizenship in order to benefit from a more beneficial tax regime in another country. So although most of our clients don't physically relocate, you can, of course, improve your tax efficiency by acquiring citizenship or residence in a jurisdiction that has a more friendly tax system and then physically relocating there and spending enough time to become tax residents. So I wouldn't say tax is a significant driver for interest in obtaining, you know, residence and citizenship by investment, but it can be a factor that some clients do take into consideration.

Okay. What's the motivation kind of driving a lot of these countries for creating these programs? Obviously, foreign direct investment is probably the foremost. Are there any other kind of reasons for it or what's really driving this? And it sounds like you guys are also in the fore of helping create more programs by talking with these other new countries and helping expand the option set too. So talk a little bit about what's kind of driving this motivation.

Ja, korrekt. So, so next to the private client business, which is what we've been talking about up until now, we also have a government advisory practice. And so we actually strategically advise governments on how to create these programs, how to design them, how to implement them. And of course, then, you know, we assist them to make sure that the due diligence is up to the levels that they need to be to make sure that only the right people are able to get residence and citizenship. And that includes all sorts of, you know, analysis in terms of enhanced due diligence, anti-money laundering checks, and all those types of things. So we help them create the programs and then through our networks and offices and contacts around the world, we then promote the programs and bring the investment. And as you rightly said, the key focus, of course, is foreign direct investment, or what we like to call sovereign equity, right? Because, you know, it's particularly coming out of the pandemic, a lot of countries have put in all sorts of economic stimulus packages and job support schemes. And this, of course, has led to them, you know, digging into their copper and their reserves. And a lot of them are realizing the benefits of, you know, this innovative industry where I can actually create something— correct me— and actually raise significant FDI through these programs. So if you look at the, the countries around the world that do this, You know, Portugal, over the sort of 10, 11 years that they've had their Golden Visa, has raised €8 or €9 billion in that process. Some of these Caribbean islands, it's in the hundreds of millions of dollars. And these are very small islands that are reliant on tourism, which also took a big knock during COVID So they really look to these programs, you know, in some cases as a bit of a, you know, lifesaver, but also they They raise the funds to then invest into their strategic initiatives, infrastructure projects, all sorts of things like that.

Yeah, very interesting. This is probably more of an aside, but I'm just curious, you know, not being super familiar with some of the European countries, but obviously Malta and Austria, you said, are kind of the, you know, the premium ones to get into. How did they become So, just the status that they have now of the freedom of travel and what kind of drove that. It's so interesting, those two countries in particular.

Yeah, so it's the European Union that of course always, you know, they're very strong economies and as a bloc, of course, even stronger. So, we have this, we call, we have this Henley Passport Index that we released on a quarterly basis, which ranks all of our passports according to the number of countries you have visa-free access to. And if you look at the top 10, you know, next to, you know, UK, US, Australia, New Zealand, the rest are all EU members. And then you have Singapore, Japan and Korea. So that's really your sort of top 10, top 20 nations around the world. And what puts them at the top of the list or what allows this, you know, visa-free travel particularly on the reciprocal waiver space, is that these are all countries that have a similar economic standing, historical links, and, and the importance of that, they reciprocate this visa-free access and, you know, free trade and these types of things. So that's what makes them such strong countries. And in terms of Malta and Austria specifically, so not only do they have very good passports from a travel perspective, but they are members of the European Union. And that gives the additional benefits of these settlement rights across the block.

Very, very interesting. And one of the things I wanted to round it out with, so talk a little bit about the EB-5 program, right? So now this is a program for foreigners coming to the US and some of the things that the US has made available. Talk about what that program looks like, maybe others that are available to, to those that want to migrate or have some residence or some freedom of travel to the US?

Yeah, so the US, like most countries, of course, has a wide range of visas available, right? A lot of them are sort of more skilled-based work permit type visas. If you look at the EB-5, it's a pure investor visa. So very broadly, the principle behind the EB-5 is as a foreigner, I can invest, the starting amount is $800,000, and I invest that into a project usually run by what's known as a regional center. And that project creates 10 jobs in the US on my behalf, the investor, and in return I get a green card. So the EB-5 is not citizenship, but it's permanent residence and a pathway to acquiring through an investment of at least $800,000 into one of these projects. That creates 10 permanent jobs in the US, I get a green card. And that allows me, of course, to come and live in the US and my children to go to the top schools and universities and for us to build our life. So that, that's very broadly how the EB-5 works. There is also an E-2 investor visa that's available. And this— there is no particular, particularly minimum investment requirements or job creation, but you need to invest into your own business in the US. And through that, again, you get— you actually, you don't get an immigrant visa, you get a nonimmigrant visa. So I can come to the US and work, but it doesn't necessarily link me directly into a green card or citizenship. So those are the two sort of main sort of investor visas. The EB-5 is for anyone that can prove, you know, clean source of funds and has the intention to come in. The E-2 is only available to treaty countries. So the US only has a number of countries that they have an E-2 treaty with. And so not all countries can actually have access to that, to that E-2 visa.

Okay. Okay. And is it the— a green card is permanent, right? So it's, it's not for a set period of time or if the jobs somehow, you know, don't exist 10 years from now, does that impact your status?

No. So once you have it, so the way the process works is I won't go into too much detail, but you get a, you get a conditional green card after about a year or two of the application. And that condition is on that project creating the jobs. And once we prove that the jobs have been created, the conditional green card becomes unconditional and then it's permanent residence.

Okay. Okay. I'm assuming just through your advisory, you help your clients work through some of the nuances of those kind of proving that and just making sure you can secure the green card and, and all that?

Yeah, exactly. So, so it's very much a hand-holding, white glove service. I know our clients are, of course, all sort of high net worth individuals from, from all corners of the earth. I think on average we serve about 100 different nationalities each year, and they, of course, have very high expectations in terms of being handheld through what is often quite a complicated process. So we've got a big global footprint. We've got offices in all major markets now. And that's, that's exactly what our core business is, is, you know, advising on all the different options. We typically, you know, for us, it's important to understand exactly what your objective is. Is it visa-free travel? Is it educating the kids? Is it just having an insurance policy available? Is it actual relocation? And then once we know the objective and the family profile, and that's important because in all, in all these programs, you would always have your main applicant, who is typically the breadwinner or the source of funds, and they need to be at least 18 years old. And they can include their spouse, they can include their children. In most programs, they can include adult children up to certain ages. And sometimes they have to be— usually they have to be single. They have to be financially dependent, and in some cases they also have to be in full-time studies. So it is possible to include adult children in that once-off investment. And in some programs you can even include your siblings, you can include your parents, you can include your parents of the spouse. So you can really have a large family going into one of these and all getting residence and citizenship. And so once we understand those two elements, the objective and the family profile, We can quite quickly narrow down, you know, from the 40-odd options to 1 or 2 that probably make the most sense. And then of course we help to actually execute that strategy from, from A to Z.

So cool. Dominic, thanks for coming on. This was really, really insightful. And man, you got the, got the travel bug kind of coming up in me now. So I got to kind of talk with you some more here. But very cool. What's the best way for people that might be interested in learning more about kind of how you work with clients and different programs available to reach out?

Yeah, so we've got the website henleyglobal.com. We're on all the sort of typical social media channels, you know, LinkedIn, X, Facebook, Instagram. So, you know, you can reach us through many mediums. As I said, we've got a number of offices around the world and especially now across the US from, you know, New York to LA, Chicago to Miami. So all our contact details are on the website. I think it's, you know, probably worth saying We don't charge for consultations, so, you know, we're happy to jump on a call or come and meet anyone that's interested to have this type of discussion, you know, to understand the landscape. And if there's something interesting, of course, we'd love to help with that process. And yeah, so it's pretty, pretty easy to find us online.

Awesome. Well, thank you so much for coming on. Really appreciate it. And I'm sure our listeners got a lot of value.

Thanks, Ben.