The Dominican Republic is one of the most beautiful countries in the Caribbean. Millions of tourists visit it every year, thousands prefer to spend the colder part of the year there, and hundreds decide to change their surroundings and move to the tropics. Most people wanting to spend more time in the Caribbean wonder if it is even possible. In this blog, we will present the options you have for a longer stay in the Dominican Republic.
It is important to remember that the Dominican Republic operates a visa-free regime. This is regulated by law DGM-04-2021 of the General Directorate of Migration. This means that any person visiting the country with a valid passport can legally stay for 30 days. After this time, they should leave the country. What if someone would like to stay longer? What are the solutions?
The first solution is to leave the country “for a weekend.” Simply leaving the country immediately renews our ability to spend another 30 days in the Dominican Republic. We can repeat this action indefinitely. The Dominican Republic is located in Central America. This provides an opportunity to visit many countries in the region. This is exactly what a large portion of people wintering in the country do. Flights to Orlando, Bogotá, Cancún, or Lima are not expensive at all. I described their prices here: https://casa-dominicana.com/koszty-zycia-w-dominikanie-cz-ii/.
The second option is simply an extended stay. The Dominican Republic is the last country that would want to expel a tourist. More than 20% of the country’s GDP comes from tourism. This is key information in this matter. Of course, according to law, the Dominican Republic reserves the right to prohibit re-entry for such a person. However, no one has heard of a case where an average tourist received a ban on entering the country for overstaying. What you need to remember is the fee we are required to pay upon departure. Exceeding the stay by even one day will cost us 3,500 RD$. This is equivalent to ~$60 USD. We will have to pay this amount at the airport during our departure. This applies until we have stayed in the Dominican Republic for 90 days. From day 91, the amount increases to 5,600 RD$ ($100 USD). The fee table is broken down over 10 years.
The third option is, of course, obtaining residency, but this is a topic for a separate blog. A few years ago, residency could be obtained by purchasing real estate for $200,000 USD. At this time, the law has been reformed and unfortunately this option is no longer available. However, purchasing real estate can be an important factor in obtaining it! Residency can be obtained based on a pension, being a rentier, or by entering into marriage with a Dominican citizen. More about this here: https://casa-dominicana.com/jak-zamieszkac-w-dominikanie/.
The last option is to extend your stay to 120 days. This means we will be able to spend 120 days in the country completely legally. This is a solution that the Migration Office presented relatively recently. It is the simplest of the options currently available. After spending 120 days, we will have to leave the country if we do not want to pay a fee at the airport. The process itself is very simple to complete. Simply go to the migration office website (https://servicios.migracion.gob.do/), fill out a short application, and then submit the required documents to this service. What the virtual officer will ask us for is first name, last name, passport number, date of entry and exit from the country, local phone number, and place of residence. The documents we will need to submit are a scan of the passport, a flight ticket showing the date of departure from the country, a bank statement that ensures we will not be an economic burden to the country, a medical certificate certifying that we are not chronically or contagiously ill, and the last entry stamp. After this time, a document allowing us an extended stay of 120 days will be automatically generated, which we should receive within 3 days. The cost of obtaining an extended stay of up to 90 days is 2,500 RD$, 120 days – 4,000 RD$. Below we provide the contact details of the office and the website, in case someone needs to contact them directly. It can be seen that the fee for issuing an extended stay permit is comparable to the penalty fees upon departure. In practice, this means that if we do not need to handle any official matters and our stay is purely tourist in nature, the decision to legalize the stay is purely practical.
WWW: https://migracion.gob.do/en/servicio/stay-extension/
Office address: Autopista 30 de Mayo, Esquina Héroes De Luperón, Santo Domingo República Dominicana
Phone: 809-508-2555 ext. 5689/7011
Email: info@migracion.gob.do
Interestingly, just a few years ago, completing a similar procedure involved a long and laborious process that could take up to a month and depended on the decision of one director. At this time, the process has been automated and is easy to organize. Currently, this is the best solution if we need to organize official matters in the country and need legal residence. There is no denying that many people have not used the option of legally extending their stay until now. On many Dominican forums, we can read that if we want to spend more time in the country, we do not need to do anything and it is enough to pay the fee at the airport.
If you would like to learn more about the country, travel, investing, or real estate? Follow our website and other profiles on all known social media under the hashtag #casadominicana. We are in Poland in Warsaw at 70 Prosta Street and in the Dominican Republic in Bávaro, where Leszek lives and can tell you best about the country he has lived in for 9 years.
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Jędrzej Pacak
