Montenegro

• Housing and commercial premises a foreigner buys in their own name, on the same terms as a citizen of the country.
• Closed: natural resources, agricultural land, forest, cultural monuments, islands and the border strip of 1 km. There is an exception: land of up to 5,000 sq. m can be bought together with a residential house on it.
• One rule for the whole country. In Budva, Tivat, Ulcinj, Kotor and Herceg Novi a foreigner buys on identical terms; only local taxes and the rules on short-term letting differ.
• State of the documents. In Herceg Novi, under a 2025 law, a property without valid building permits cannot be sold, so before buying one checks whether they exist.

Buying a completed home (resale market). The tax is paid by the buyer, on the assessed market value determined by the tax authority:

Example. An apartment at 200,000 euro: 4,500 euro on the first 150,000 and 2,500 euro (5% of the remaining 50,000), 7,000 euro in all. A notary charges by tariff, and the cadastre entry costs a token sum; we have not confirmed the amounts. One consulting page estimates the buyer's total costs on a resale at 5–8% of the price; this is its estimate, not the law.

Buying from a developer: the first sale of a new property is subject to 21% VAT, and no property transfer tax is charged.

Holding. Annual property tax — from 0.25% to 1% of the tax valuation, the rate is set by the municipality. This range is taken from a law firm page. For resale housing in Herceg Novi, an official municipal decision gives 0.50%; the document dates from 2015, and later changes we have not checked. For other towns the rates are available on request.

Selling:

• Tax — 15% of the difference between the sale price and the documented purchase price. This is a law firm page, not the law; the rate is the same for residents and non-residents.
• There is no holding period after which there is no tax. Exempt are the main and only home, transactions between spouses, and gifts to close relatives.
• The base is indexed for inflation. Documented renovation costs are deducted.
• A non-resident files the return themselves by the end of April of the following year: nobody withholds the tax.

• Long-term is permitted for foreign owners.
• Short-term is permitted after registration in the tourism register, categorisation by the municipality and tax registration. The owner registers the guests themselves; in Kotor and Tivat there are apps for this, Lotos Turist and eBoravak. The tourist tax depends on the municipality.
• Tax: a flat 15% on income after a deduction without documents. The deduction is 30% for long-term rent (effectively about 10.5%), 50% for short-term (about 7.5%), 70% when letting through a licensed agency. The return is filed by 30 April.
• Municipal surcharge: per the same legal page, 13% of the calculated tax in Budva, Kotor and Tivat. In Herceg Novi and Ulcinj it is not yet confirmed.

These are taxes in Montenegro. Tax in the investor's country of residence is calculated separately.

Non-residents are lent to by individual banks under their own rules. An example is Hipotekarna banka: for a non-resident with sufficient solvency, a term of up to 10 years, for a resident up to 20. We have not found maximum loan shares set by the central bank.

• Citizenship by investment ended on 31 December 2022.
• Residence permit through property: a tax valuation of the property of at least 150,000 euro; the law has applied since 17 January 2026. The rule is for third-country nationals. The information is taken from a trade news site; we have not read the text of the law.

A nationwide housing price index is not yet available in our base: the Bank for International Settlements does not publish it for Montenegro, or it has not been loaded by us. The four lines (in euro and dollars, with and without inflation adjustment) have therefore not been built.

What can be said without an index: the euro has been the official currency here since 2002, so for a buyer with euros there is no exchange-rate risk. For a buyer with dollars, the rise or fall of prices in euro is additionally distorted by the dollar-euro rate; this cannot be calculated without a price series.

The reference base has 72 districts: Budva 20, Herceg Novi 15, Tivat with Porto Montenegro 14, Kotor with the bay 12, Ulcinj 11.

Figures read on pages. The first rows are rental yields of one-bedroom apartments in Budva from the table of one consulting page "as of May 2026" (the page was updated on 5 October 2026); the rest are asking prices and rents:

What can be seen:

• The yield of one-bedroom apartments in Budva by this table is from 3.8% to 5.1% net. The lowest is in the Old Town, the highest in Rozino.
• Tivat is a premium market around the marina.
• For Herceg Novi there is only a 2019 report; we do not quote figures that are six years old. For Kotor and Ulcinj there are no prices on the pages read.

• Who may own: a foreigner buys offices and shops in their own name. The closed categories are the same as for housing.
• VAT: 21% is charged on the first sale of a newly built property; resale is exempt from VAT and is subject to the property transfer tax on the same scale as housing. Deduction of input VAT is the right of a VAT payer, not of a private person.
• VAT on rent: only long-term residential rent is exempt from it. Rent of non-residential premises is taxed at 21%. A person with a turnover over 12 months of no more than 30,000 euro is not a VAT payer. This is per the text of the law, the 2022 edition of the catalogue.
• Tax on income from commercial rent: not yet confirmed separately; available on request.
• Hotel rooms are sold to individuals under two models. "Condo": a five-star hotel on the coast or in the capital, a four-star on the north and in the centre, with rooms in commercial operation at least 10 months a year. "Mixed": no more than 50% of the rooms are sold. A management contract with the operator is mandatory; the ownership is entered in the cadastre after the operator receives its licence.
• Rental rates: modern offices in central Podgorica — 13.5–15.5 euro per sq. m a month (prime up to 17), for the first half of 2024, asking rates; the source is a report by CBS International and Cushman & Wakefield. For Budva and Kotor there is no agency data on offices.
• Where it is concentrated: the office market is in Podgorica, not on the coast. Retail projects on the coast are in the districts of Budva (a retail park of about 12,000 sq. m, under construction at the time of the report) and Kotor. In Porto Montenegro housing sits alongside offices. In Ulcinj retail is concentrated in the centre — the Čaršija.
• Yield and vacant space by segment are not yet available; we will provide them on request.
• The agencies' figures describe the upper segment, not the market as a whole.

Permitted. A typical scheme: about 35% at signing, then payments at construction stages, the balance on handover; a 70 to 30 split also occurs. Buyer protection, a mandatory developer account and a penalty for late delivery are not yet confirmed in our base.

The reference base has 5 developers and operators: Adriatic Marinas (Porto Montenegro), Azmont Investments (Portonovi), ALSEIR PROPERTIES DOO, ECO-BUILD, Porto Budva Estate.

Listings: Nekretnina.me, Oglasi.me, CMM Montenegro, Luxestate, Eco-Build Montenegro, HomesOverseas.ru.