188 visa – Premium Investor Stream

The 188 visa Investor stream is for high net worth applicants who will make an investment in Australia of at least AUD15 million and maintain business or investment activity in Australia for at least 4 years. The 188 visa offers a pathway to permanent residency in Australia.

Step one. Receive a nomination by Austrade.

Nominations for this visa are made by Austrade invitation only.

Step two. The state or territory will assess your EOI and nominate you to apply. You will then be invited to apply for the 188 visa via the Business Investor stream.

If a state or territory nominates you, you will receive an invitation from Australia’s immigration department to apply for the 188 visa.

Age Limit

You must be under 55 years old to receive an invitation to apply for the visa. Exceptions can be made if the nominating State or Territory conclude your activity will make an exceptional economic benefit to that State or Territory.

Your visa application will be supported by supporting documents. These are:

Identity documents

Passport page: You’ll need your current passport page with your photograph and personal details and passport expiry date.

A national identity card if you have one.

Proof of name change if applicable.

If this applies to you, you will need to include documents that prove your change of name. This could be a marriage or divorce certificate, documents that show any other names you have been known by, a lodgement of a name change on the Australian Registry of Births, Deaths or Marriages or equivalent.

65 Points

You will need to score 65 points. Points are based on your:

Age

English language level

Qualifications

Professional experience

Net personal and business assets

Special endorsements

English language Requirements

If you are applying for a 188 visa through the Entrepreneur stream, you will need to provide from that you have functional English.

Other family members you are including on your application who are over 18 years old will need to have functional English.

If other family members do not have functional English, you will need to include a statement outlining your intention to pay the second visa application charge for each person who does not have a minimum of functional English.

Premium Investor Stream documents

A statement of Assets and Liabilities Position

Provide a Statement of Assets and Liabilities Position (SALP) by filling out Form 1139A Statement of Assets and Liabilities Position (146KB PDF).

You will need to complete the form within 3 months of being invited for the visa.

Evidence of Ownership and Value of Assets

It’ll be necessary to show proof that you own the assets you propose to use to make the complying investments and supporting evidence to confirm their value (minimum AUD15 million).

Along with this, you’ll need to in include the liabilities (if any) against each asset. For example, mortgages, loans including unsecured and third party loans, and credit cards. Label each document, identify the asset or liability and cross-reference it to the SALP.

Cash assets, will need to be supported by bank statements or certificates of deposit for the date nominated on your SALP.

For real estate assets, include the following for the dates nominated on your SALP:

    • evidence of ownership (title deeds)
    • evidence of value (valuation certificate by an accredited property valuer)
    • evidence of relevant mortgage

For business loans, provide the following for the date nominated on your SALP:

    • loan agreements
    • loan ledger listing all loan transactions
    • bank statements for you/your spouse and the business, showing all loan transactions

For business ownership, provide evidence of ownership. This can include one or more of the following:

    • evidence of purchase
    • share registers
    • company registers
    • share transfer documents
    • historical company extracts
    • annual returns of directors and shareholders
    • partnership, trust or franchise agreements

For listed companies, provide the published annual report.

For unlisted companies, provide financial statements. These financial statements should be prepared by an independent accountant to international accounting standards. Or you can provide a review report prepared by qualified auditors in accordance with ISRE2400.

For stocks and bonds, provide stocks trading account statements; stocks or bonds registers; stocks, fixed interest securities or debentures certificates, or transfer certificates. Provide these for the date nominated on your SALP.

For assets held via a trust, provide a complete copy of the trust deeds, including all schedules.

Your investment

After you lodge your application, you must make a complying premium investment of at least AUD15 million in any of the following options:

    • Australian securities exchange listed assets
    • Australian government or semi-government bonds or notes
    • corporate bonds or notes issued by an Australian exchange listed entity (or wholly owned subsidiary of the Australian listed entity), investment grade rated Australian corporate bonds or notes rated by an AFS licenced debt rating agency
    • Australian proprietary limited companies that operate qualifying businesses (providing goods or services to the public with a profit-making intention, and not passive or speculative in nature)
    • real property in Australia excluding residential property
    • deferred annuities issued by Australian registered life companies
    • state or territory government approved philanthropic contribution

To be an eligible fund, a further requirement is that cash is to be no more than 20% of a fund’s net assets and derivatives are to be used for risk management purposes only.

Premium investors may elect to make a portion or the entirety of their investment by way of a philanthropic donation (endorsed by a state or territory government.

You will need to supply a signed declaration on your proposed method of fund transfer to make the complying premium investment.

This should be accompanied by an overview of your complying premium investment plans for Australia. This must include an outline of your intended investments in Australia.

You will be notified when to make the complying premium investment. This will happen after you apply for the 188 visa.

Partner documents

You’ll need to provide documents proving your partner’s’ identity (eg passport photo page) and their relationship to you.

Establishing your partner’s relationship to you can be done by providing a marriage certificate or providing 12 months of proof that you are in a de facto relationship, such as, joint bank account statements, billing accounts in both names, joint leases or mortgages.

Dependents under 18 years old

You will need to include identity documents, proof of their relationship to you (such as a birth certificate) and character documents where applicable for dependents, such as children, applying with you on your 188 visa application.

You will also need to obtain the written consent (using Form 1229 or by providing a statutory declaration) from anyone else who has a legal right to decide where the child lives and/or is not coming to Australia with the child. This needs to include the signature and photograph of the person who provided this written consent. Written consent can also be a statutory declaration giving their consent for the child to travel to Australia on this visa, or you can present an Australian court order allowing the child to migrate to Australia or details of a law in your home country allowing them to migrate, adoption papers or other court documents.

If you have dependents who are over 18 years old, you will need to include Form 47a detailing the ways this applicant is dependent on you. You can also include other forms of proof, such as their tax records, evidence they are currently studying and/or they live with you.

If the dependents applying are over 18 years old, you must show how they are dependent on you or your partner. You can include evidence that they live with you, tax records, proof they are currently studying, banks statements showing you have financially supported them.

If one of the dependents applying on your application is over the age of 23 years old, contact us to learn what options are available to you.

You will be notified when to make the qualifying investments which will occur after you have lodged your visa application.

You must hold a complying investment continuously for the life of your provisional visa.

Income that you earn from your investment in Australia is subject to Australian taxation law.

Step 5. The 188 visa is granted.

The 188 visa is valid for 4 years and 3 months and enables you to travel in and out of Australia and carry out business and investment activities in Australia.

Subclass 188 visa –  Investor stream obligations

You must maintain your investment in your nominating Australian State or Territory for at leat 4 years. You must also have a genuine intention to live in your nominating State or Territory for at least 2 years.

While you and your family hold a 188 visa, you must comply with the visa conditions and Australian laws, including workplace laws if you are running a business. All workers in Australia have rights and protections at work that include rates of pay and workplace conditions.

When can I apply for PR?

The subclass 188 visa – is a provisional visa. To extend your stay in Australia and obtain permanent residency in Australia, you can apply for the subclass 888 visa which gives the visa holder PR in Australia. You can begin the application process for the 888 visa after you have held the subclass 188 visa for 3 years and 11 month.