Chinese households keep building assets outside China: mainland outbound securities investment excluding reserves reached almost $2tn by the end of 2024, up from roughly $900bn in 2020, according to a China Everbright Bank report. Four residence routes carry most of that demand, and they differ enormously in cost, waiting time, and what they are actually for.
US EB-5 was historically the defining route for wealthy Chinese families, and the 2022 Reform and Integrity Act split it into two very different timetables. The unreserved category remains heavily backlogged for mainland-born applicants: on the April 2026 visa bulletin the final action date still sat in 2016, meaning the people receiving immigrant visas today filed about a decade ago. The reserved categories — rural, high-unemployment, infrastructure — were still showing Current for every country, China included, through mid-2026. Rural projects carry the $800,000 minimum and priority USCIS processing, and Chinese and Indian investors together account for 73% of post-RIA filings, with rural projects making up 57% of those. Practitioners widely expect the rural category to retrogress eventually; the current window is not permanent.
The UAE Golden Visa is where the most Chinese money is moving right now. The property route needs holdings valued at AED 2m or more and gives a renewable 10-year residence that can sponsor a spouse, children, and parents; 2026 rules made mortgaged properties easier to count, allowed aggregation across multiple freehold properties, and admitted qualifying off-plan purchases. The real driver is not the visa in isolation but the money infrastructure around it. Family-related entities registered at the Dubai International Financial Centre reached about 1,000 by mid-2025, against roughly 800 at the end of 2024 and 600 in 2023. Singapore's post-2024 compliance tightening pushed some family-office KYC approvals past a year, where DIFC typically runs two to six months. Singapore has not shrunk — it passed 1,500 registered family offices in 2026 — but the marginal flow has tilted to the Gulf. The UAE recorded a net inflow of roughly 9,800 dollar millionaires in 2025, first in the world.
Malaysia's MM2H stands out because the Chinese share is unusually high. Of 14,535 applications lodged since the 2024 revamp, 7,600 came from mainland Chinese nationals — more than half — with Taiwan second at 2,419 and Hong Kong at 604. Malaysia approved 3,172 applications in 2025, generating an estimated RM3.875bn (about US$983m), of which RM2.35bn went into bank fixed deposits and RM1.51bn into residential property. The tiers run Silver (US$150,000 deposit, property from RM600,000, five years), Gold (US$500,000, RM1m, 15 years), Platinum (US$1m, RM2m, 20 years), plus a cheaper SEZ tier. Silver took 83.5% of 2025 approvals, which tells you what MM2H actually is: a family relocation and lifestyle route, not an investment-migration programme in the EB-5 sense.
Greece's Golden Visa has long been dominated by Chinese nationals, who held more than 6,000 permits by early March 2025. The programme has drawn over €10bn since 2013, including a record €2.32bn in 2024. But the thresholds that took effect on 31 August 2024 changed its character: property in high-demand areas including Athens and Thessaloniki now requires €800,000, other regions €400,000, and the old €250,000 level survives only for commercial-to-residential conversions and restorations of listed or historic buildings. In January 2026 Greece added a route that avoids property entirely — €250,000 into a startup registered with Elevate Greece, for a five-year permit, conditional on the company creating at least two jobs in year one and maintaining them for five years, with the investor holding no more than 33% of equity or voting rights. Bond, deposit, and fund options sit alongside at €500,000, €500,000, and €350,000 respectively.
These four routes solve different problems. EB-5 buys permanent US status, but for mainland-born applicants the unreserved category is no longer something you can realistically plan around — only the reserved categories are usable today, and that window has a shelf life. The UAE Golden Visa buys speed and financial plumbing: fast setup, fast banking, a stable tax position — but it is residence, not a path to citizenship. MM2H buys a low-cost family living arrangement, and the dominance of the Silver tier shows most participants are not chasing investment returns. Greece's Golden Visa buys EU residence and Schengen mobility, though the August 2024 thresholds moved urban property into a different price bracket entirely.
One constraint sits underneath all of them: getting the money out legally. The US$50,000 annual individual foreign-exchange purchase quota, CRS information exchange, and source-of-funds documentation usually bind earlier than any visa condition does. Every one of these programmes requires traceable, lawfully sourced funds, and no amount of programme flexibility compensates for a weak paper trail on that step.
If the goal is permanent US status, check the current visa bulletin to confirm the reserved categories are still showing Current before filing, and do not plan around the unreserved timetable. If the goal is a usable overseas base with banking as quickly as possible, the UAE Golden Visa is normally the fastest, but keep the investor Golden Visa distinct from the Green Visa and Virtual Work Residence, which have different eligibility. For a family relocating long-term on a smaller budget, the MM2H Silver tier is what most applicants actually use. For EU residence, decide the Greek region first, since the €800,000, €400,000 and €250,000 tiers map to completely different property types and locations, while the 2026 startup route sidesteps property altogether. Amounts and conditions on all four move; confirm on the relevant government page before applying.
Malaysia
United Arab Emirates
Greece
United States
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