I realize you have gone over this a million times, but could I just ask you guys to let me know how to apply EU immigration law in my case?

I'm Italian, married to a Nicaraguan man. We have both been accepted at a prestigious university in Barcelona to get our Master's degrees, and we plan on leaving this summer. We live in Nicaragua. The problem is, neither the Spanish nor the Italian consulate seem to know what to do in our case with respect to how my husband should legalise his stay in Spain. The Spanish consulate wants to ship him off with a student visa. The Italian consulate suggested we set up residence in Italy (which we could do) and then live in Spain with our Italian papers. I know that works in my case, but I'm pretty sure my husband has to apply for some sort of residency card while in Spain! Now, the only residency card he's eligible for is the "family of EU resident" card, BUT some pages I've consulted say he absolutely MUST get a family regrouping visa before he can apply for it, while others say that the law was recently reformed and now you only have to prove that you and your spouse are not divorced or legally separated so that the non-EU spouse can apply without a visa.

The thing is, we would gladly apply for a visa, but the people at the Spanish consulate are asking me for a copy of my residency card, which, 1) isn't even compulsory in my case and 2) how can I have it when I haven't even gotten to Spain yet? Am I suppose to leave my husband behind and send for him later??

I don't really care if my husband can work or not, I just don't want him to be living in Spain illegally. What should we do?

Thank you and best regards,
EVa

 

The Spanish consulate either doesn't know or doesn't care. The Italian consulate has been much more helpful, but they can tell us what to do when moving to Italy, not when moving to Spain.

I think we're just going to go through Italy, get our residency there, and then once we are in Spain we'll see what happens. Worst case scenario, if they want my husband to get the family regrouping visa, at least he'll be a resident of Italy, so we can get it at the Spanish consulate in Rome rather than having him fly back to Nicaragua.

Thanks for your prompt response.

 

Thanks for the clarification. Now I have another question.

If we move to Italy, my husband can apply (apply mind you, after that it takes 2 more years to get it!!) for his Italian passport after residing in Italy with me for 6 months (otherwise it's 3 years after the day you get married). Suppose for a second we established our residence in Italy, and then spent most of our time in school in Spain (but kept our legal residence in Italy). Since Italy and Spain are both Schengen countries, and since as an Italian I am technically not required to get a residency card to live in Spain, are we still residing in Italy in the eyes of the Italian law, or not? And if not, how would they know, anyway? As far as they can tell from our passports, we never left Italy!

Best regards,
EVa-

 

You're absolutely right. In essence, I want to be able to study in Spain with my husband without having to deal with the Spanish consulate here and with as little hassle as possible. I'm pretty confident that it will not be a problem if we apply for his residency in Spain without his having a visa (see the following link, particularly the part about "Your Family's Rights": http://europa.eu.int/youreurope/nav/en/ ... ts/en.html), HOWEVER, in case we do run into some kind of trouble, I want to be able to say that our last legal residence was Rome, so that my husband doesn't have to come all the way back here to get some sort of family regrouping visa for Spain. So in that sense, it's not so much about wanting to do things at a more knowledgeble consulate, but rather at a CLOSER consulate!!
Just as a side note, Nicaraguan citizens are not required to obtain visas when visiting Spain for less than 90 days, AND the Italian consulate here will give us a family visa (national visa, for Italy) for him in 4 days without asking for too much paperwork.
Oh, and lastly, just FYI, the reason I said I didn't have to get a residence card was because Spainsh law doesn't required EU citizens living in Spain to get residence cards, all you have to do is register at town hall to let them know you're living there. So I guess in that sense EasyExpat is right, once I register at the town hall in Spain then I won't be legally residing in Italy!