Greek Golden Visa Application: Full Document Checklist for Vietnamese Investors

The Greek Golden Visa application comprises four main groups of documents: personal documents, proof of financial standing, investment-related documents, and supporting legal documents (power of attorney, health insurance). For Vietnamese investors, each document must go through a specific legalisation process before it is recognised in Greece. The 11/09/2026 milestone — the date the Apostille Convention takes effect for Vietnam — will fundamentally change this legalisation method.

This article lists every document in the Greek Golden Visa application in detail, clarifying the technical requirements (issue validity, language, certification), while also setting out two preparation scenarios corresponding to the two legal phases: before and after 11/09/2026. See also the country profile Greece for the overall context, and the overview article Greece Golden Visa for the programme’s conditions.

All information in this article is based on the latest updated regulations published by the Greek Ministry of Migration and Asylum, Law 5038/2023 and the amending Law 5162/2024.

General principles when preparing a Greek Golden Visa application

Before going into the specific list, three overarching principles apply to every document in a Greek Golden Visa application.

First, every document must be translated into Greek or English, with a valid certified translation. Translation can be done in Vietnam (through a translation provider recognised by the Department of Justice) or in Greece (through the Greek Ministry of Foreign Affairs’ translation service or a recognised lawyer).

Second, Vietnamese public documents must be legalised through the standard process to have legal validity in Greece. This process depends on when the application is submitted — before or after 11/09/2026.

Third, some documents have a limited period of validity. A criminal record certificate and a health certificate are usually valid for only 3–6 months from the date of issue. Investors need to plan the timing of these documents carefully to avoid them expiring before the application is submitted.

Document legalisation — two key legal phases

This is the most complex and time-consuming part of preparing a Greek Golden Visa application for Vietnamese nationals. The two legal phases — before and after 11/09/2026 — follow completely different processes.

Before 11/09/2026: four-step consular legalisation

During this phase, every Vietnamese public document must go through four processing steps in turn. The first step is a notarised translation from Vietnamese into English or Greek by a translation provider recognised by the Department of Justice.

The second step is certifying the translation at the local Department of Justice or the Ministry of Justice. The third step is consular legalisation at the Consular Department of Vietnam’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs (Hanoi headquarters) or the Ho Chi Minh City Department of External Relations. The final step is consular certification at the Greek Embassy in Hanoi.

The whole four-step chain usually takes 3–6 weeks and costs around 1–2 million VND per document, depending on the number of copies. Investors with a large family (a couple + 2 children + 4 parents) may need to process 30–40 separate documents.

From 11/09/2026: only an Apostille is needed

According to the HCCH (Hague Conference on Private International Law), Vietnam deposited its instrument of accession to the Apostille Convention on 31/12/2025. The Convention takes effect from 11/09/2026 between Vietnam and member states that raise no objection, including Greece (a member since 1985).

After this milestone, Vietnamese public documents used in Greece will need only a single Apostille stamp, issued by the Consular Department of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Hanoi or the Ho Chi Minh City Department of External Relations. The two intermediate steps (Ministry of Foreign Affairs legalisation and certification at the Greek Embassy) are removed entirely. According to Vietnam’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Apostille mechanism could cut time and cost by up to 90% compared with traditional consular legalisation.

For investors with a flexible timeline, delaying the submission date until after 11/09/2026 is a choice worth considering on economic grounds. See also the dedicated article on The Apostille for the specific Apostille issuance process.

Group 1: Personal documents of the main applicant and family

This is the core document group, applying to both the main applicant and every accompanying family member (spouse, children under 21, and both sets of parents).

Document	Technical requirement	Applies to
Original passport	Valid for at least 18 months (24 months recommended)	All members
Passport scan	All pages bearing visas or stamps	All members
Birth certificate	Original or extract, translated and legalised	All members
Marriage certificate	Issued within 6 months, translated and legalised	Applicant’s spouse
Criminal Record Certificate No. 2	Issued within 6 months, by the Department of Justice	Persons over 14 years old
EU-standard passport photos	4 photos, 35x45mm, white background	All members
Health certificate	Issued within 3 months, confirming no infectious disease	All members

Some important notes. The criminal record certificate must be Type 2 (providing full details of any convictions, including those already expunged), not Type 1. Under the regulations of the Greek Ministry of Migration and Asylum, this is a mandatory requirement for background assessment.

For accompanying parents, only proof of blood relationship via a birth certificate is required — there is no requirement to prove financial dependency as in some other European programmes. This is a distinctive flexibility of the Greek Golden Visa.

Group 2: Proof of financial standing and source of funds

Greece applies a strict Anti-Money Laundering (AML) due diligence process to every Golden Visa investor. The application must demonstrate that the investment capital has a legitimate, transparent and traceable source.

The proof-of-funds document set includes personal bank account statements for the most recent 6–12 months, stamped and confirmed by the issuing bank. The statements must clearly show cash inflows and outflows, helping the assessing authority verify a regular level of income.

Income can come from a range of sources, each requiring its own supporting documents. For business owners: the business registration certificate, financial statements for the most recent 2–3 years, profit distribution minutes, and company account statements. For salaried employees: the employment contract, 12 months of salary statements, and confirmation from the tax authority that personal income tax obligations have been fulfilled.

For investment income: existing property sale contracts (demonstrating cash flow from prior transactions), the land use right certificate, and dividend reports from joint-stock companies. For income from inheritance or gifts: a notarised will, an asset settlement document, and a certified gift contract.

All the financial documents above must be translated into English or Greek and legalised according to the process corresponding to the submission phase.

Group 3: Documents relating to the property investment

This is the group of documents generated after the investor has completed the property purchase in Greece. All documents in this group are prepared by the lawyer in Greece, but investors need to understand them in order to oversee the process.

Document	Issued by	Purpose
Notarised sale and purchase agreement	Greek notary	Proof of the transaction
Land Registry registration certificate	Hellenic Cadastre	Confirmation of ownership
Transfer tax payment receipt	AADE Tax Authority	Confirmation that tax has been paid
Transfer statement for €250,000 EURO+	Greek bank	Proof of investment cash flow
AFM tax code	AADE Tax Authority	Financial identification
Certificate of no legal encumbrance	Land Registry	Property free of dispute

For the €250,000 EURO investment route under the commercial-to-residential conversion mechanism, the application must additionally include a construction/renovation permit issued by the local urban authority, together with the contractor’s agreement if the work is still under way.

For the €250,000 EURO route under the cultural heritage restoration mechanism, a certificate from the Greek Ministry of Culture confirming that the property is listed as heritage is required, together with the approved restoration project.

Group 4: Supporting legal documents

This group comprises supporting documents that enable the lawyer to represent the entire process remotely, plus the mandatory medical documents.

The Power of Attorney (POA) is the single most important document in this group. It allows the Greek lawyer to carry out procedures on the investor’s behalf, such as opening the AFM, opening a bank account, signing the sale contract, and filing the residence permit application. The POA must be drawn up at a notary office in Vietnam and then legalised according to the process for the relevant phase (four-step consular legalisation before 11/09/2026, or Apostille after this date).

International health insurance is mandatory for every member included in the application. The policy must meet European standards, with a minimum cover typically required of 30,000 EUR, valid in Greece. Some Greek banks and insurers offer dedicated policies for Golden Visa holders.

In addition, for families with children aged 18 to 21, further documents are needed proving the child is unmarried and still financially dependent. Under Law 5038/2023, children aged 21 or over cannot be included in the initial application — which is why many families prioritise submitting before their child turns 21.

Notes on source of funds and AML due diligence

The Greek Ministry of Migration and Asylum works with financial oversight bodies to apply AML due diligence to every Golden Visa application. Certain situations commonly trigger a request for further explanation or risk rejection.

Funds that cannot be traced — for example, a large single cash deposit into an account with no supporting explanation — will be a red flag. Investors whose income is mainly cash need to build a transparent cash-flow record for at least 12–24 months before starting the application.

Funds transferred from Vietnam to Greece must come from an account held in the main applicant’s own name, not through a third-party intermediary. This is an important requirement to prove the true beneficial party behind the investment. Where capital needs to be transferred through several smaller transactions rather than one, full supporting documents for each transfer must be kept to demonstrate continuity.

For investors with income from multiple sources (business plus investment plus inheritance), it is advisable to prepare a cash flow summary in English, together with an illustrative cash flow diagram. This document is not required by law, but it helps the AML review proceed significantly faster.

Summary and next steps

A Greek Golden Visa application comprises four main document groups, with a total of 25–35 items for a typical family of four (a couple plus 2 children). The hardest part is not gathering the documents but legalising them — and this is exactly the step that will be significantly simplified from 11/09/2026, when the Apostille Convention takes effect for Vietnam.

Practical advice for investors: if the application is ready to proceed and there is no time pressure, delaying the start date until after 11/09/2026 will save 4–8 weeks of preparation time and cut legalisation costs by 50–70%. Conversely, if there is an urgent goal (a child approaching 21, legal safety reasons, and so on), investors should not wait and should proceed under the current consular process.

The next recommended read is the 7-step Greece Golden Visa process to understand how the application is processed after submission, then refer to the article renewing the 5-year Greek Golden Visa to prepare well for the next cycle. For investors interested in the tax code, the article Greek AFM analyses in detail the registration process for this mandatory financial identifier.