Can you get a Spain digital nomad visa as the director of your own UK company, and what can it cost in tax?

One company, two offices

Call them Robin. It isn't their name. For years Robin has run a freelance training business through their own UK limited company. No employees, just Robin. They pay themselves a small salary and take the rest as dividends. The plan: move to Spain on the digital nomad visa and carry on as before. So Robin asked the group a simple question: can I apply as the director of my own company?

The first long reply said yes, and set out two ways in. One: apply as a business owner, showing that you own the company and that it has stable, continuous activity. Two: apply with a work contract between you, as a person, and your own company.

Then came the catch. Applying as the owner, the member wrote, "can hit a snag with the tax office". Once you are approved, your company could be treated as having a permanent establishment in Spain (a taxable presence there, because the person running it now lives there). That would mean registering the business in Spain and paying company taxes in Spain. And a business registered in Spain sits badly with a visa that requires work for a business outside Spain. The member called it "a Catch 22 between the Immigration office and the tax office", and pointed Robin to a Spanish tax lawyer before choosing that route.

Robin asked whether option two was easier. "Generally, yes," came the answer.

A second reply listed what a company owner would need to prove: ownership or control of the company; at least 12 months of activity; the latest corporate tax return; proof of investment in productive assets; a social security report on the company's employees; and, depending on how Robin was paid, a personal tax return. Robin replied that they were confident they could show all of it.

We do not know which way Robin went.

The trap has a short name: one company, two offices. The immigration office and the tax office each look at the same company, and they can reach different conclusions. A visa can be approved on a structure that later costs money on the tax side. This is one member's reading, not legal advice, and handling varies between offices; the official sources are where to confirm it before acting.

For anyone holding a quote, the tax side is rarely on it. A visa quote covers the visa. It usually says nothing about what the tax office will make of your company once you live in Spain, or what a tax advisor would charge to look at it first.

The question most quotes leave unanswered: who checks how the tax office will treat my company once I am approved?

The cheapest structure to get approved is not always the cheapest one to live with.

For Spain's digital nomad visa, we have fees from 9 firms on file. The typical fee is about €1,000. The middle half sit between €950 and €4,000. Some cover the application only, some the full package.

If you run your own company, did anyone price the tax side before you moved?

Based on a real case, shared publicly in an online group and anonymised. Fees on file as of November 2026.