FBI apostille for Costa Rica residency
Costa Rica: a popular place to retire
If you have been considering retiring or moving to Costa Rica, you are not the only one. Thousands of expats move to this great central American country in search of a balance between mild weather, affordability, and safety.
Many people take this option into consideration as Costa Rica can offer residents a great deal in various respects. However, you will need to be aware of the legal implications that come with this decision.
First of all, you will need to consider the type of residency that you can qualify for, namely Permanent, Temporary or Special Category residency.
In brief, Permanent residency is only available to a foreigner if one either has a direct family relationship with a citizen of Costa Rica or already holds a temporary residency status.
Most Costa Rica residency applications fall under the Temporary residency category. These include being the spouse of a Costa Rican citizen, be an investor, or a professional person such as an executive, manager, international press correspondent, or a sports figure among others. Religious workers and missionaries based on a religious order recognized by the Ministry of Foreign Relations are also accepted.
Rentistas who receive at least $2500 monthly, and Pensionados who show that they have a lifetime pension source of at least $1000 per month, can also apply for temporary residency in Costa Rica.
The residency application process involves various steps. You can either represent yourself or else hire an attorney to help you through the application process.
The residency application is broken down into two main areas, namely, the section where one provides the required personal information, and the part where various supporting documents need to be presented.
The application will need to present the full name of the applicant, along with his or her nationality, occupation, marital status, place, and date of birth, name of father and mother, as well as the original date and point of entry to Costa Rica. A telephone number and physical address in Costa Rica also need to be supplied.
The supporting documents for the application for residency include the birth certificate, a marriage certificate where applicable, and proof of income or some form of justification. Other relevant documents to be presented include a photocopy of the passport, two photographs, and a background information sheet.
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FBI report with apostille for Costa Rica
An applicant will also need to present a police certificate of good conduct. In the case of a US citizen, this will need to be an FBI Criminal Background with an apostille.
The FBI report and apostille are crucial elements of every residency application process. The Department of Immigration will require any applicant to submit a background check. Recently this requirement changed slightly. While before it was acceptable to have this background search carried out by the local city, county, or state, now applicants have to have this search carried out by the FBI at a national level.
The FBI can provide you with the Identity History Summary. This is the technical term for what most often refer to as the criminal history record. This process can be carried out online or by mail. On the website, there is a section specifically for Identity History Summary Checks of the FBI, specifically https://www.edo.cjis.gov/ Here one can start the application process by entering the required details. A secure link accompanied by a pin number will be sent to the applicant’s email address so that the status of the application can be reviewed and to access the result. One can also opt to have the result sent by mail.
It is essential to mention that part of this process will also entail fingerprinting. One can get fingerprinted at certain authorized Postal Service facilities and authorized channelers. A list of these can be found online. The fingerprints have to be taken on the FBI’s standard fingerprinting form or by biometric fingerprinting. Once your application is complete you can then wait for the Identity History Summary to be issued.
The translation of supporting documents will also need to be carried out if the documents mentioned above are in English. All documents will need to be translated into Spanish.
Foreign documents will need to be authenticated for use in Costa Rica. Having documents authenticated or apostilled is quite straightforward as long as your country is a member of the Hague Convention on the Legalization of Foreign Documents, to which Costa Rica is a signatory. All it will involve is to have the government office in your country of origin who handles the apostille of documents to take care of this process. If, however, your country is not a member of this convention, then you will have to interact with the Costa Rican Embassy or the Consular Office to have your documents authenticated.
For US citizens, the US Department of State will be responsible for FBI apostilles.
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