Liars and cheaters

We started to move to Portugal in Dec 2017. Got our NIF numbers, and signed the contract for an apartment in a condominium in Nazazé in June 2018. We moved in about a year later, in September, due to delays.

I was still working, and both of us were registered back home officially. Finanças told us it would be best (see further down …).

My husband is a trained salesman and had ideas on how to open business in Portugal. Nazaré is a tourist magnet, and one idea was to open a Tuk-tuk business (electric driven) to take people from the beach to Sitio and the Fortress.

We told the vice president of the Municipal, now MP, who we happened to know because he rents out apartments to tourists in Nazaré. We lived there for a short period of time.

My husband never got the license to drive tuk-tuks. The license went to Portuguese people, and they practically stole the idea.

Approaching retirement, I wanted a house instead of an apartment. We looked around and found a project further south, closer to Lisbon. We sold the apartment in Dec 2021and we bought the new one in February 2022.

Finanças did not accept that we were residents, because we had a Swedish address, so they wanted us to pay full tax. After 2 years of fighting, they agreed to let us pay the Portuguese 50% tax. What about “better to remain registered in Sweden”? For them, yes, but for not us.

When we build the new house, we were on guard because we knew from experience that Portuguese builders cannot necessarily be trusted. One day in Nazaré, during construction, my husband found a chimney in the middle of our patio ..! We were on the top floor, but our downstairs neighbor had convinced/bought the builder to let him have his grill outside his kitchen, meaning that the chimney would go through the middle of our patio. After a lot of anger and frustration from our side, the chimney was torn down and the downstairs neighbor had to find another place for his grill.

We call this “lack of consequence thinking”, which is a deficiency widespread among Portuguese people. When you chatter about nothing with the cashier in the supermarket, you delay other people. When you want to pay in cash (which normally means that you are cheating Finanças) it takes a lot of time … But people here seem to accept it.

However, the new house also turned out to be one long array of delays. They did not work when it was raining, they did not work when it was too hot, and they did not work during summer vacation, which is normally when the weather is good. We should, according to plans, move in in April 2023, but only after shouting a lot, we were allowed to move in in June. The house was by then not fully finished.

We wanted drainage around the house, but they do not know what that is. We really had to insist that drainage was included. We also had to insist that the pool was securely anchored in the rock so that it would not slide into the valley. That cost extra, but it was worth it.

According to the contract, there should be an inspection by an unwilling person when the construction was finished. We waited for that for months. Finally, we brought in our own inspector, and he made a report counting several deficiencies. When we approached the builder to ask for the inspection, they told us that it had been done just before we moved in (however, the contract said we should be present, and we were not).

Then we went to the Municipality to ask for the documents, and it turned out that the builder’s architect had falsified my husband signature …! On the builder’s command, surely. A great crime in Portugal!

The architect pleaded guilty towards us, and then a process began to keep us quiet. We got communal sewar system, the road was paved etc. When we say something is wrong with the house, the builder is here within days (guarantee, but if this had not happened, they would probably not have come at all).

Now we have given up and want to move back to our home country. Problem is that we have an outdated “Certidãopermanente” where it still shows that we had a tax debt. Then you cannot sell your property. Since March, when we realized the severity, and the final debt was cleared, we have asked Finanças to get an updated document. But they do not respond. Absolute silence.

So, right now, we are held hostage in Portugal.

Long live Portuguese bureaucracy!