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I'm in the process of trying to buy a house in the Azores. I've already seen the house in person and had an inspection done etc. Its a cash deal with no realtor involved. The problem I am having is they want me there in person to sign zee papers. I found someone there willing to act as POA for me but the catch 22 is they want me there in person to sign the POA papers! Only alternative offered is to go to the Portuguese Embassy in DC and sign the POA papers there. Its 6 hours away and I can't drive that far as I have a limited license due to failing vision.
I am wondering if anyone has found a way to successfully purchase a house there from the US?
Hi there when you say you have found someone there willing to do POA I presume you mean a registered solicitor?
I did my exchange remotely, I had to get a UK solicitor to witness my signature. This proved more difficult than expected as although I provided a translation she wouldn’t accept it unless it was an officially done one. Forgotten what the word is for that. As she said it could otherwise say anything at all.
I wasn’t there for completion either but had by then been to see the Pt solicitor and signed POA in front of a notary.
If you are paying cash will you have an adequate paper trail to prove you own the place? I’d be a bit concerned by that.
good luck with it
@aspidistra I think what the solicitor wanted was a certificate of translation, it is needed whenever you have to translate official documents to be send to another country, basically it identifies the translator and he/she declares that it is a faithful translation.
To purchase the property there are only two options, or you go to the notary yourself or you send a representative that has a POA, your problem is the POA, as aspiridistra said, must be done in person, so you have to sign in front of the lawyer / solicitador / notary or in your case the Embassy.
Thanks. The person who will be the POA was my AirBnB host there and works for Povoacao city hall. He talked to a lawyer there and gave me another option:
- You will need to go to your area certified notary, there the notary will do your POA in English, make sure that it is a complete or a full POA, then you sign in his presence.
- The notary then will mail/FedEx to the closest Portuguese Consulate.
- Once in the Portuguese Consulate it will take 2 business day for them to digitalize, stamp and legalize/recognize the POA.
- The Portuguese Consulate will then Mail/FedEx back to your Notary, I guess he has to sign/confirm he received the POA.
- Once the notary has the POA he will then hand it to you.
- You will have to Mail/FedEx to the POA.
So now I have have to find a lawyer/notary here that is will to do all that. For me going to the Embassy in person would be very hard as I'd have to find someone willing to drive me 6 hours each way.
Did I understand correctly and you will sign an English POA without having a translation in Portuguese?
Because the notary will not accept only a POA in English, you have to have it in Portuguese and it needs to be certified.
Also, what do you mean by a full POA? Does it represent you for everything? Because if it is that is risky, in this case what you need is a POA for someone to represent you when buying your house, so to protect yourself you should make it clear in the POA that it is done for this, identifying the property that you are intending to buy, so there is no chance of that POA being used for anything else.
