Flying Start to 2021 for Grenada CIP: Approvals Up 30% YoY in First Quarter

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If Q1 figures are any guide, Grenada’s CIP is on track for a fifth consecutive record year as the share of investors choosing real estate nears historical highs.

Recently published figures from Grenada's Finance Ministry show the country's Citizenship by Investment Unit approved 96 applications in the first quarter of this year. That's the highest Q1 figure ever recorded for the Caribbean program, and 30% higher than in Q1 2020.

The CIU received 118 applications during the period, six of which it rejected. The 96 approvals resulted in 310 new citizenships.

During the same period, the Finance Ministry reported program revenue/investments totaling EC$70.2 million (some US$26m), which, if extrapolated to the end of the year would reach an aggregate for 2021 of EC$280.8 million, well above the EC$253 million raised in 2020, itself a record-figure.

While investment in Grenada's CIP is rising overall, growth has come disproportionately from the program's real estate option:

Of the EC$70.2 million investors injected in the program in Q1, EC$45.9 million took the form of real estate investments, EC$15.12m were donations, while budgetary fees accounted for EC$9.2m.

71% of applicants in Q1 opted for real estate investments rather than NTF-contributions, the highest such share observed since 2015 (when the program was much smaller and fewer real estate options were available).

The Grenada CIP's real estate market has had a turbulent spring, the effects of which will only become visible once Q2 data is released later this year. In late May, Warren Newfield, erstwhile ambassador-at-large for Grenada and the developer of one of the Grenada CIP's larger projects, resigned from his diplomatic posts, citing tensions with the government.

Some two weeks ago, the same developer filed for international arbitration against the government, writing also in an accompanying statement that the government had "destroyed a successful project."

On CBI Real Estate Watch, you can track the construction progress of developments approved under citizenship by investment programs: