How I Got My Visa to France

I have loved France since my first trip to Bordeaux in 2010. It was my first time in France and I loved the food, the wine and the people.

But this love turned into an obsession when, after Bordeaux, I stepped out of the Paris metro onto the Champs-Élysées. Light, energy, mystic! There was magic in the air. I felt like I had been visiting this city my whole life and I was just coming back home.

Since then Paris has held a firm hold on my heart. Over the years, I’ve taken countless trips exploring France and Paris in particular. I have visited the city and spent a few months there in 2019.

Last August, after another stay, I thought to myself, “What if I go back?”

I was a little tired of the NYC dating scene, the rising cost of living, and creatively feeling like I was in a rut. With the advent of AI and the change in the industry for creators like me, I was a little lost as to what was next, career-wise.

In short, I needed a change.

And Paris seemed like the perfect place to go.

It’s cheaper than NYC, I already had friends there, I’ve always wanted to learn French, it would make a great base for exploring Europe, and I could start writing my next book there. There’s nothing like a change of scenery to get the creativity flowing!

But the question remained: how? do it Do you go to France?

However, they do not have a digital nomad visa, and if you go on your regular Schengen tourist visa your duration is limited to three months.

Well, it turns out that it actually isn’t that Difficult (and while I can only speak for Americans, I doubt the standards are the same for Canada, Australia, Kiwis and other “developed” nations).

If you want to go to France, you have four main options:

• Student visa
• Long Term Visitor Visa
• Entrepreneur
• Talent Visa

A student visa is fairly straightforward. You need to be enrolled in a full-time university program and demonstrate that you have sufficient funds to support yourself (around 600 euros per month). A friend is currently there on this visa, as she is doing an intensive nine-month French fluency program. You still have to apply for a visa, but if you’re attending an accredited school, chances are you’ll be approved. Another advantage of this visa is that you can work part-time on it!

But this visa is dependent on staying in school, so if you drop out or drop out, it’s void. However, when you’re done working, you can change it to a “job seeker” visa, which can give you up to six more months in France (or more depending on how long your program was).

I thought about applying for a business visa, but the application process is quite complicated and can take months to be approved. You have to set up your business in France – and that’s a lot of paperwork. You have to show that your business makes money, has clients (at least one of them is French), and can support you full time (you have to pay at least the French minimum wage). They will heavily scrutinize your assets and finances and require you to register your business in France and pay French taxes.

Additionally, France offers talent visas. If you are an expert in your field (with verified accreditations and accolades), this may be a good visa to apply for, especially if you plan to stay in France for a long time and physically work there. But, again, you have to have a source of income and a plan to do physical business in France. If you are not an academic but someone in the arts, you need to show how you are going to add to the “culture of France” in some way.

While I will meet the requirements for both of these visas, the process for either takes time, and, since I am not sure that France will be my forever home, I have decided not to go through with the process.

So I went with a long-term visitor visa, officially called a VLS-TS visitor. It allows me to stay in France for up to 12 months and is renewable in the country. This comes with a number of restrictions, however: I cannot physically work here and I am not allowed into the French social welfare system.

This is also the visa that many Americans (and mostly retirees) are coming on. If you have passive income or retirement savings and just want to live in France, this is a good option for you. It allows you to set up a bank account and it can be renewed indefinitely.

The paperwork for this visa (which I’ll get into in a bit) mainly comes down to whether or not you can help yourself. French authorities want to make sure you don’t become a burden on the system.

My biggest question is whether or not I can “work” on this visa. Many creators and digital nomads are applying for — and getting — this visa.

But remember: you are not allowed to work on this visa, so how will you work if you can’t work?

So let me take a moment to talk about “work” from a legal perspective.

As I mentioned, there is no digital nomad visa that allows you to work in France. And the French tax office said last July that remote work is considered taxable — but there are no official rules. This is only their opinion and no progress has been made in formulating this opinion. In fact, my visa doesn’t even come with a tax number, so it’s impossible to tax me. I could not pay tax even if I wanted to.

The visa office asks how you will support yourself while you are in France and one of the sources of income they accept is “income from work”. I was very open that my source of support would be income from this blog and my books.

The system there hasn’t really caught up to remote work. It still defines “work” as something you physically do that can take a job away from a French person.

So can I run a walking tour in Paris? No. Can you work in a cafe? No

But does writing this blog post count as work? After all, no one is paying for it. This is a free resource. Does going to a cafe count as working on the next great American novel? What about my weekly newsletter with affiliate links (that generate income)? Is writing considered work?

The gray area is considerable, so it’s best to talk to a lawyer. I recommend Daniel Tostado (yes, that’s his real name), one of the top American-French immigration lawyers in Paris. He owns a large law firm and regularly meets with government officials to clarify the rules and regulations. He gave me some solid advice.

For this long-term visitor visa, the application process is quite simple. You go to the French government website, fill out your application, take the application number to the TLScontact website, and make an appointment. (France outsources the placement process to this company, which then sends everything to the French consulate for approval.)

The main things you will want to demonstrate are that you have housing for the 90 days on your application and enough income to support yourself. They just want to make sure you’re not a burden on the system. I went overboard. Here’s what I brought to my appointment:

• Application (you need to bring a printout)
• Confirmation of appointment
• Additional passport photos
• Proof of accommodation (this can be Airbnbs, hotels, or someone’s home — if it’s the latter, make sure they’re the owner!).
• A letter confirming that I will not work.
• A financial summary letter explaining why I’m moving and my source of income
• Health insurance that meets French legal requirements (I used Mondasure).
• Three months’ bank statements showing regular deposits.
• Another bank account, my tax returns, and my W-2

I didn’t need another bank account, tax return, or W-2 (they weren’t needed) but the lady at the appointment said the more proof you have the better and it wouldn’t hurt. And another friend who got this visa did not bring more than what was asked in the application form. But I didn’t want to take any chances!

At the appointment, the staff double-checks your paperwork, takes your biometric data, collects the fee, and then sends your passport to the embassy for processing. Officially, it takes up to 15 days to process your visa, but everyone I know will get it back within a week.

The worst part was not knowing whether you were approved or not until your passport was returned. While you can track the progress of your application, you won’t know the decision until you receive your passport. While I was waiting (and anxiously scrolling), I looked on Reddit and found that most of the denials were due to lack of income or housing issues, which seem to be the two most important things to get perfect on your application.

Once you get your visa back, you can enter France at any time after the start date. After entering, you have 90 days to register your visa with the state (they give you a little QR code with instructions). This allows you to “officially” stay on this long-term visa. (This is more of a paperwork type.)

Once this is done, there is nothing else for you to do and you can stay in France (and Europe) until your visa expires!

So, if you are considering moving to France, these are your options. But, as usual, I am not a lawyer and this is not legal precedent. Regarding work and other issues or questions, it is important that you seek legal advice and get their expert opinion!

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