Author
Long-term resident status for third-country nationals is called “Daueraufenthalt EU”. The right to permanent residence in Austria and unrestricted access to the job market is granted by the residence title “Daueraufenthalt EU”.
To obtain it, a beneficiary of international protection must fulfil the following conditions:[1]
- Lawful residence in Austria for the last 5 years preceding the application for long term residency. Half of the period between the application for international protection and the awarding of refugee status or subsidiary protection is counted towards the five-year period. When the duration of the asylum procedure was longer than 18 months, the whole period is counted.[2]
- Successful completion of “Module 2” of the so-called agreement on integration (“Integrationsvereinbarung”), entailing knowledge of German at B1 level.
- General requirements for obtaining a residence permit, namely:
- A regular income per month of € 1,217.96 or more if the cost of rent is higher than € 359.72 for a single person as of 1 January 2024; for every child extra € 187.93;[3]
- Sufficient health insurance;
- Suitable accommodation; and
- The person must not present a security risk.
The filing of additional papers may be required in some circumstances.
There is no difference between refugee status holders and subsidiary protection status holders.
In practice the responsible authority is usually the district council (Bezirkshauptmannschaft). There are exceptions for some cities such as Vienna where the responsible authority is MA 35, whereas in Graz it is the Styrian Land government. Once all costs have been paid, the applicant may be eligible to acquire the residence permit. The costs for the procedure amount to about € 210 for persons over 6 years old, and € 195 for persons under 6 years old.
1,746 beneficiaries of international and subsidiary protection obtained a long-term resident status in 2023, compared to 1,360 in 2022 and 1,193 in 2021.[4] The sharp increase since 2018 (498) is likely to be the result of the focus of the BFA on withdrawal procedures of protection statuses. In cases where the international protection has been granted more than five years ago, a withdrawal procedure can only be started after a long-term residence status is granted by the responsible settlement authorities.
[1] Article 11 NAG
[2] Article 45(12) Residence Act.
[3] ASVG Ausgleichszulagen Höhe 2024, available in German at: https://shorturl.at/kVPGY.
[4] Ministry of Interior, Fremdenwesen, 2022, available in German at: https://bit.ly/3KZkOUI, Ministry of Interior, Fremdenwesen 2023, available in German at: https://shorturl.at/wLTx1.