Ahead of the Home Office’s heralded reform of the UK Tier 1 Investor Visa program – the particulars of which remain a known unknown – investors in December scrambled to submit applications. 2018 was a record year for the program; Application volumes have not been this high since before the price-doubling in 2014.
Statistics from the UK Home Office show 92 main applicants and 117 dependents received entry clearances under the UK’s Tier 1 Investor Visa scheme in the fourth quarter of 2018, bringing the year’s total to 376 main applicants and 590 dependents, up from 350 and 531 in 2017. The figures constitute the best year on record for the program under the GBP 2 million minimum investment requirement regime, instated at the end of 2014.