The route most families take
The non-lucrative visa costs 140 dollars per applicant for US citizens and 106 dollars for other nationalities, plus a 13 dollar residence permit fee collected at the same window (Consular Section of the Embassy of Spain in Washington DC, checked 2026-08). Every person in the family pays both, children included.
The income test decides most applications. It is 400 percent of IPREM, Spain’s Public Income Indicator for Multiple Effects. IPREM in 2026 is 600 euros a month, or 7,200 euros a year across 12 payments, so 400 percent is 28,800 euros a year for the main applicant. Each accompanying dependent adds 100 percent of IPREM, which is 7,200 euros a year. Two parents and two children therefore need 50,400 euros a year.
Read the name of the visa literally. It permits no gainful activity of any kind, and the consulate spells out that this includes remote and online work. You sign a notarised affidavit saying so. If a parent intends to keep a US job, the telework visa is the route instead, at 190 dollars per applicant for US citizens. Its income test is a multiple of the Spanish minimum wage, and the consulate page still shows the 2025 minimum wage, so we withhold the 2026 figure until an official source publishes it.
Each child needs a file of their own: application form signed by a parent, photo, passport, forms EX-01 and 790-052, insurance proof and the disclaimer. Only applicants aged 18 and over file a criminal background check. The legal decision period is three months (Consular Section of the Embassy of Spain in Washington DC, checked 2026-08).
After you land, the foreigner identity card must be applied for within one month of entry, at a Foreign Nationals Office or police station. A first card costs 16.08 euros per person on tasa 790-012 and a renewal card 19.30 euros. The first card is valid for one year and renewable.
Schooling
Your children have a legal right to a state school place. Foreign children under 16 have the right and the duty to be educated in Spain, with access to basic education that is free and compulsory, and that right extends to the qualification and to the public grants system on the same terms as Spanish nationals. Basic education runs from age 6 to 16.
Arriving mid-year is provided for in law. Authorities must place a child who joins the Spanish system late at the year matching their age, prior knowledge and academic record, and that placement is guaranteed at compulsory school age. The same law assumes language help rather than an English classroom: authorities must run specific programmes for pupils with serious language gaps, alongside placement in an ordinary class, not instead of it. Admission calendars are set region by region, and we could not verify the Comunidad de Madrid calendar at an official source today, so no dates appear here.
International school is the line that moves a Madrid budget. Published tuition runs from 9,300 to 26,610 euros per child per year. Runnymede College charges 3,100 euros a term at pre-nursery and 7,900 euros a term in Years 12 and 13. International College Spain charges 4,216 euros a term for Kindergarten 3 and 4 and 8,870 euros a term for Grades 11 and 12. Both publish 2026-2027 fees on a three-term year. The American School of Madrid publishes annual tuition of 12,173 to 25,072 euros, though its fee page states no academic year. Add one-off entry costs: 3,000 to 3,500 euros in enrolment fees at ICS and Runnymede, and an 8,100 euro capital fee at the American School of Madrid.
Healthcare for the family
Spanish law grants publicly funded healthcare to foreign residents only where they are not obliged to prove health cover by another route. The non-lucrative visa obliges exactly that, so your family is normally outside the public system at first.
The policy must meet a specific standard: public or private insurance from an insurer authorised to operate in Spain, covering every risk the Spanish public system covers, with no excess, no copayment, no waiting period and no coverage limit, valid for one year and maintained for the whole stay. Travel policies are refused, and an insurance card is not proof.
There is a public route later. Anyone without publicly funded cover can buy into the system through the convenio especial at 60 euros a month under 65, or 157 euros a month at 65 and over. It needs a continuous year of residence in Spain first, registration on the municipal padron, and no other public health cover, and it is signed per person, not per family.
We publish no private family premium, because no insurer’s own published rate was verified.
What the first year costs
Take the lines you can pin down. Visa and permit fees are 140 plus 13 dollars per person, then 16.08 euros per person for the identity card in Spain. Schooling in Madrid is the largest verified line, at 9,300 to 26,610 euros per child, plus entry fees. On housing, a deposit of one month’s rent is compulsory, any further guarantee is capped at two months’ rent, and property management and contract costs fall on the landlord, not you.
Rent needs care. SERPAVI, the state rent reference system, publishes tax-declared rents for the municipality of Madrid: a median of 869 euros a month across 300,447 rented flats, and 1,166 euros at the 75th percentile, on 2024 data published in 2026. It publishes nothing by bedroom count, so we read the median flat, 66 square metres, as the two-bedroom benchmark and the upper-quartile flat, 84 square metres, as the three-bedroom one.
The mover line is never published here, because no official body publishes what an international move costs. The only honest number comes from quotes against your own inventory and dates. If you request those quotes through a form on this site, we are paid when you do.
One euro was 1.1669 US dollars on the European Central Bank reference rate for 2026-08-26.
What surprises families
The FBI background check trips people up. It must be federal, not state or local, issued within the six months before you apply, apostilled so the apostille certifies the signature on the check itself rather than a notary’s seal, and sworn-translated into Spanish. Bank certificates are equally exact: they must state the balance as of 31 December of the year before you apply and the average balance over the last 12 months (Consular Section of the Embassy of Spain in Washington DC, checked 2026-08).
Tax residence arrives faster than families expect. You are habitually resident for Spanish income tax if you spend more than 183 days in Spain in a calendar year, counting sporadic absences unless you prove tax residence elsewhere, or if the main base of your economic interests sits in Spain. Where a spouse and dependent minor children live habitually in Spain, residence is presumed unless you prove otherwise.
Pets need a longer runway than a plane ticket. A dog, cat or ferret from the United States needs a microchip, a valid rabies vaccination, an official animal health certificate in Spanish with a declaration and certified vaccination records, and entry through an authorised Traveller Entry Point, where the Guardia Civil reads the chip. Animals under 15 weeks are refused, since vaccination cannot happen before 12 weeks and 21 days must pass afterwards. No rabies antibody test is required from the United States.
Who should not move here
Do not take the non-lucrative route if a parent needs to keep working. The ban covers remote work for a foreign employer, and you sign an affidavit saying so.
Do not plan on a free state school place solving the language question. The law promises a place and language support, not teaching in English. If English-medium schooling is non-negotiable, Madrid tuition of 9,300 to 26,610 euros per child per year is your base cost, not an upgrade.
Do not assume public healthcare starts when you land. It generally does not on this visa, and the paid public alternative asks for a year of residence first.
And if your budget only works at the median Madrid rent of 869 euros a month, look again. That figure covers sitting tenancies too.