Can I buy property in Bulgaria as a foreigner?
Yes for flats, houses and other buildings, whatever your citizenship. Land is different. The rule, from Art. 22 of the Constitution: EU/EEA citizens and entities: may acquire land (Constitution Art. 22, post-accession). Non-EU persons: may not own land unless an international treaty ratified by law allows it; may own buildings or hold land via a Bulgarian company.1
For a flat in a block this rarely matters. For a house with its own plot it decides the structure: an EU or EEA citizen signs in their own name, while an Indian, Turkish, UK or US employee usually owns the building personally and holds the plot through a Bulgarian company. The detail is on who may buy land.
Is buying through a Bulgarian company worth it?
The flat is yours in your own name. The land under a house is where citizenship starts to matter.
Only when there is land you cannot own personally. An EOOD is registered in about 3 days10 once the file is complete, and then it lives its own life: it files annual accounts and pays 10%39 corporate income tax on any profit.
A company that only holds the plot under your family home earns nothing, but the accounting and filing obligations stay. We compare that running cost with the value of the land before we suggest it.
Does buying a home make you a Bulgarian tax resident?
It can, and for someone arriving on a work permit it usually happens anyway. The test in the Personal Income Taxes Act: PIT Act Art. 4(1): resident regardless of citizenship if (1) permanent address in Bulgaria (unless centre of vital interests is elsewhere), or (2) present in Bulgaria more than 183 days in any 12-month period (resident for the year in which 183 days are exceeded), or (3) posted abroad by the Bulgarian state or a Bulgarian enterprise, or (4) centre of vital interests in Bulgaria. DTT tie-breakers prevail.27
A permanent address in a home you own is one of the two triggers, even before 183 days pass. Once resident, Bulgaria taxes your worldwide income at a flat 10%28. If you keep a rented-out flat or a company back home, that income enters the Bulgarian return too, subject to the double tax treaty with that country.
Taxes on the purchase itself and notary fees are not published in our reference data, so we quote them in writing for your deal rather than print a figure here.
Can you buy property in Bulgaria and get residency?
Not through the purchase. A home does not give a residence permit. The investor route to permanent residence under Art. 25(1)(6) of the Foreigners Act starts at BGN 1,000,000 (about €511,29246 at the fixed rate 1.95583) and is a separate procedure — see permanent residence.
Most buyers we work with already hold or are getting a single permit, valid up to 3 years45. After 5 years45 of legal residence, permanent status becomes possible; an address you own helps with the paperwork, not with the count.
How do you sign if you are not yet in Bulgaria?
By power of attorney. Many buyers sign the preliminary contract while their permit is still in progress. You sign the power of attorney before a notary where you live, with an apostille where required; we arrange the translation into Bulgarian and the notary in Bulgaria relies on it on the day.
When this check is not what you need
- ❌Choosing a town, a resort or a property — we do not list or recommend homes.
- ❌A residence permit through the purchase — there is none; see the work and investor routes above.
- ❌Rental yield or resale forecasts — outside the legal side of the deal.