How to get a Second Home (digital nomad/retirement) visa for Indonesia

18 min readNov 14, 2022

The Second Home visa is a visa to live in Indonesia, which should become available from 24 December 2022.

There is no ‘digital nomad’ visa, and no prospect of one in the future: ignore people talking about this. However, the Second Home visa replaces the retirement visa, which was only open to those aged 55+, while Second Home is for all ages. There is an implication that in the modern era (the retirement visa was created in the 1990s), people can live in Indonesia using foreign-sourced income, for example by working online. This is not formally regulated in Indonesian law, but it is tolerated on the understanding that your work does not have any connection with Indonesia. E.g.:

translating documents into Indonesian for a client in London — OK
translating documents into English for clients in Bali — not allowed
photography — not allowed
life coach for fellow foreigners in Bali — not allowed
teaching children in the USA via Zoom — OK
teaching children in Indonesia via Zoom — not allowed
building websites for clients in Thailand — OK
building websites (or even one website) for clients in Indonesia — not allowed

Note that once you have obtained a second home visa and subsequently residence permit, you will be a tax resident of Indonesia and subject to global taxation, although tax treaties mean that this is not a huge problem necessarily, although:

if you are a British pensioner, your British state pension will be frozen and not uprated with inflation, from the moment you leave the UK. Go live in the Philippines instead (or another country which has a social security agreement with the UK).
if you are from a country where pension income is not taxable, then unfortunately you will have to pay tax on your pension in Indonesia; however, civil service pensions from whichever country are generally taxable only in that country, and thus not in Indonesia

It is a legal requirement to obtain an NPWP (tax number) if you have income over the threshold of 54 million per year, and you must therefore file an annual (calendar year) tax return by 31 March of the following year.

Qualifying for a Second Home visa

There are two routes to qualify, by holding what is referred to as an immigration guarantee (jaminan keimigrasian) or proof of fund.

The first, and preferred means, is owning a house in Indonesia with the status of Hak Pakai. Please note that most real estate sold to foreigners is sold using a lease (hak sewa). Hak Pakai is not a lease, it’s a form of ownership which can be renewed indefinitely (after 30, 50 and 80 years, paying a fee of 0.3% of the land value), sold, and inherited (by foreign as well as Indonesian heirs). If you ‘buy’ a lease, then it’s uncertificated and insecure, and will not qualify you for a Second Home visa. Note that prior to 2021 it was required to have an ITAS or ITAP in order to buy a home with hak pakai in Indonesia, and these regulations are still being brought into place into the hundreds of land offices in Indonesia, so it could be that there are difficulties in actually purchasing the house in the near future if you do not have a current ITAS or ITAP, however in the medium term there should be many foreigners buying using Hak Pakai while on a tourist visa.

The house is a ‘house of residence or occupation’, which seems to be intended that you live in it (or leave it empty when you are not in Indonesia). It is definitely NOT legal to rent out the house by the day, which is classed as a ‘pondok wisata’, and requires a business permit, limited to Indonesians and companies. Renting out a property longer term is classed as property income under which 10% flat tax is payable, and is not exactly a business in law, although immigration are free to decide otherwise and deport you. It is possible that if you were living in Indonesia for six months and in another country for six months that you could rent the property out, but the legality is not clear.

There are scenarios you could envisage such as buying a house for 1 billion rupiah in say, Belitung, and living in Bali in a rented property (in the case you cannot meet the 5 billion rupiah minimum for Bali), but again the legality of this is not clear.

It should be note that the taxes on property are:

5% BPHTB payable by the buyer
2.5% Income tax payable by the seller
A fee charged by the notary, which will typically be legally restricted to a maximum of 1%
11% PPN on new properties (not on land)

Therefore, if you purchased a property in Bali for 3 billion rupiah, you can typically expect to pay 180 million rupiah, and the seller will have to pay 75 million rupiah in taxes. It is a common practice for notaries to inflate the price, so it is recorded as 5 billion in order to meet the legal minimum requirement, when only 3 billion in fact changed hands. In this case you would need to pay the 7.5% taxes on the extra 2 billion, i.e., 150 million rupiah more taxes, and the transaction could be recorded as 5 billion rupiah.

This map shows the minimum prices for foreign ownership of a house or apartment of residence in Indonesia (legal source: 1241/SK-HK.02/IX/2022):

There is a presumption against land over 2000 square metres, or owning more than one plot of land. However, both these restrictions can be overridden on application to the ministry.

Although property with the status of Hak Pakai can be mortgaged, according to Indonesian law, for the Second Home visa you are not allowed to secure any kind of debt against your immigration guarantee.

Please note that the legal and valid ownership will be with a certificate like one of these, issued by the BPN (land office):

There are all manner of papers you can find in Indonesia that purport to show ‘land ownership’, but if you do not have ‘sertipikat’ similar to those IN YOUR NAME, then you don’t qualify.

The second way to get a Second Home visa is to deposit 2 billion rupiah (rupiah NOT any foreign currency) in a state-owned bank, which you are not allowed to touch the entire time you are in Indonesia, and which immigration can check up on and demand a formal letter from the bank to prove your deposit.

These banks are (a complete list — you could likely select some different account from the standard ‘deposito’, but you MUST deposit at one of these five banks ONLY):

Bank Mandiri — interest rates of 2.5% are currently payable
BNI — 3%
BRI — 3%
Bank Tabungan Negara — 3.5%
Bank Syariah Indonesia — under Syariah principles profit sharing is offered, not interest. Variable, and likely to be over 2%.

Followers

Followers (companions) are any other foreign family members you bring with you on your Second Home visa. They do not require a separate deposit/house ownership, and there is no limit on the number of followers.

The visa/permit fees are cheaper for followers. You will need to show a birth certificate or marriage certificate that shows their relationship with you in one of the following categories:

your husband or wife
your children (of any age)
your parents

Costs

The Second Home visa costs:

3 million IDR for the primary applicant, and 2 million for each ‘follower’ (parents, children, husband or wife). The visa is only permission to enter the country, and must be formally converted to the residence permit, within 30 days, which costs:
18 million IDR for five years for the ITAS (residence permit), and Izin Masuk Kembali/MERP (the permission to re-enter Indonesia if you ever leave for even 1 day), for the primary applicant, and 9.5 million for each ‘follower’

After five years you can extend at the same cost or convert to ITAP (‘permanent’) residence permit. You may extend no more than once — after that ITAP is mandatory.

The costs for ITAP are

21 million for the first five years, and then 36 million for an ‘unlimited’ period for the primary applicant, and 11 million for the first five years, then 21 million for an unlimited period for each ‘follower’, in both cases inclusive of the re-entry permit.

After acquiring an ‘unlimited’ ITAP it is mandatory to report every five years, and obtain the re-entry permit at a cost (currently!) of six million per five years.

After you obtain ITAP it is possible (but by no means usual) to naturalize as an Indonesian citizen, which costs 53 million rupiah, and for which you will be tested and interviewed according to your knowledge of Indonesian history, culture, language.

ITAS vs ITAP

In general, there is not a huge difference between ITAS and ITAP, both must report to the civil registry office to obtain population documents (which are different from immigration documents in law). However:

an ITAS holder has an ‘SKTT’ (Surat Keterangan Tempat Tinggal or ‘document of statement of address’ or ‘temporary residence card’) and no KK (Kartu Keluarga)
an ITAP holder has a ‘KTP’ (Kartu Tanda Penduduk or ID card, and must be on a ‘KK’ (Kartu Keluarga or ‘family card’)

It is a legal requirement that you go to the civil registry office within 14 days of the the itas/Itap (not the visa) to make your SKTT or KTP & KK. Requirements are set by city/regency, but will include the ITAS or ITAP, passport, in some cases a police letter, and a letter from the head of your administrative village (lurah, kepala desa, or some other person as per local regulations).

SKTT or KTP are required for e.g. vaccinations, buying vehicles, and renewing your ITAS or ITAP. If you do not make the SKTT/KTP within the time frame, then some regencies/cities impose a fine, specified in local law, while in most there is no penalty. It is illegal to charge for population documents in Indonesia, but typically it’s common to give a 50,000rp gratuity at the administrative village level while at the civil registry office level such payments are becoming less usual. In Bali villages often claim that their local law (adat or awig-awig) allows them to impose fees on foreigners for such services, which could be any amount such as 1,000,000rp. You can enquire locally.

Adult Indonesian citizens also have KTP, although theirs are blue, while foreigners’ KTP are being switched from blue to orange. Typically holding a KTP as a foreigner will get you the ‘Indonesian’ price for government-controlled tourist attractions, while this may be extended to ITAS holders for private attractions.

In addition, it is a legal requirement for Indonesian population document holders to have BPJS Kesehatan (National Health Insurance), however it will not be possible to obtain this as an SKTT holder. For KTP holders it might be possible — the laws are contradictory: on the one hand, BPJS is for all ‘population’ of Indonesia, while on the other BPJS is considered to be part of the social justice guaranteed to Indonesian citizens under the Indonesian constitution, and Second Home visa applicants are at one level of law required to obtain health insurance, but at another they can ‘self insure’.

BPJS Kesehatan costs 150,000rp (class 1), 100,000rp (class 2), or 42,000rp (class 3), per month, per person, and if you are able to register of it, it’s a good idea to do so.

Legal basis

Directorate General of Immigration Circular Letter IMI-0740.GR.01.01 2022 on the grant of Second Home visas and ITAS, translated by me here into English with the Indonesian version
Minister of Law & Human Rights Regulation 29 of 2021 on Visas and Stay Permits
Pronouncement 1241/SK-HK.02/IX/2022 of the Agrarian Ministry/Head of the Land Office on Acquisition of Houses of Residence/Occupation by Foreigners
Government Regulation 31 of 2013 on Immigration Law implementation, as modified by regulations 26 of 2016 (on multiple entry visas), 51 of 2020, and 48 of 2021, the last amendment adding the Second Home rules.
Immigration Law 6 of 2011 as modified by the Job Creation Law 11 of 2020 to add the Second Home visa type

In general, there are three layers of law, which are the Law of 2011, which is essentially the formal structural rules and difficult to change, the Government Regulation for implementation, which can be changed to modify details, and the Ministerial Regulation, which contains the technical details. Therefore, the application procedures should be found in the Ministerial Regulation, however in this case the Ministerial Regulation was incomplete and further details were added by means of circular letter.

The general requirements for a Second Home visa application are in article 43 of the Ministerial Regulation,

a guarantor’s letter — in practice this is a ‘surat permhonan dan jaminan’, i.e. a letter of ‘application and guarantee’, which is a formal letter (a template) applying for the visa and promising that the foreigner will not behave badly, with a ‘materai’ stamp. For the second home visa this will presumably be a letter of self guarantee and application.
A passport valid for six years or more (this was reduced to 36 months by the Circular) — in practice this is uploaded online in the form of a scan of your passport cover and biodata page
a criminal record check from the country of origin — in practice this is not required
a health check to confirm that you have no infectious disease — in practice this is replaced with proof of Covid-19 vaccination, and a signed letter that you promise to abide by health protocols
proof of funds in the sum of $2000 or equivalent
proof of health insurance: in the application system this can be replaced with a simple ‘self-insurance’ declaration
two 4 cm x 6 cm photographs — in practice this is replaced with a digital photo uploaded online

Plus (from the circular):

Your CV
Bank letter/statement showing the 2 billion deposit OR certificate of land ownership IN YOUR NAME

Visa applications are made online, and payment for the visa fees (referred to as ‘PNBP’ or government non-tax payments) can be made via any bank in Indonesia, Tokopedia, etc.

After entering Indonesia with the visa, you will need to report to the immigration office within 30 days with paper copies of all the above, plus a signed letter of commitment, which basically states that you won’t be a nuisance, and that you have the 2 billion OR house ownership and won’t sell/transfer/spend it while you are in Indonesia.

The letter of commitment is a signature on the following declaration:

Residence requirements

As per the above, the ITAS or ITAP is a five-year residence permit with concomitant re-entry permit. Under immigration law you are not required to physically be in Indonesia as an ITAS/ITAP holder (though you will still be a tax resident until you end your ITAS/ITAP), however if you are ever outside of Indonesia for 365+ days, then your ITAS/ITAP will come to an end for the reason of absence. You will also need to spend some time to renew/report every five years, at which time you will need to be in Indonesia.

Change of status from Visit visa to Second Home, and from other visa types

Fundamentally if you are currently in Indonesia as a foreigner you have a ‘stay permit’, which can be one of the following:

a Vist stay permit from a visa waiver (currently only for ASEAN citizens)
a Visit stay permit from a Visit visa on arrival (500,000rp fee)
an ITAS or ITAP of whatever type
a visit stay permit from a visit visa obtained before you arrived in Indonesia

If you had a Visit visa in advance, it is possible to perform change of status (alih status), at least 30 days before your current stay permit (visa) expires, but for a Visit visa waiver or visa on arrival this is not possible.

In general if you currently hold an ITAS or ITAP of a different type, and wish to obtain a Second Home visa, then you (or rather your current guarantor) must apply for EPO (‘exit permit only’), which ends your current permit giving you a period in which you must leave the country, during which it is possible to apply for an onshore visa, which is the same as an offshore visa, but is applied for from within Indonesia. Most people cannot apply for onshore visa, and both ‘alih status’ and onshore visa can be considered undesirable in the sense that they introduce uncertainty as you are in a foreign country waiting for a visa to be granted and may end up in overstay (which costs 1 million per day). Alih status does have the advantage that you do not pay the visa fee, only the stay permit & re-entry permit fees, and obviously if you are already Indonesia, it saves flying out.

Sponsors/guarantor/agents

In general, the law requires that all foreigners have a penjamin, which is a sponsor/guarantor. For the ‘retirement visa’ this was required to be a travel agency. This travel agency provision has been abolished.

For Second Home visa applicants the overarching law says one thing, which is then overriden in the implementing circular. Under Article 171C of Government Regulation 31/2013, as inserted by 48/2021

(1) A foreigner as mentioned in Article 171A (4)(b) may deposit an Immigration Guarantee in lieu of having a Guarantor, as long as they are in Indonesia.
(2) An Immigration Guarantee is given in the form of a deposit in the bank account of the Directorate General of Immgiration.
(3) Immigration Guarantee as referred to in (1) is valid for foreigners in the context of preinvestment and second home
(4) Interest earned on the Immigration Guarantee will be deposited in the state treasury.

However, Circular 740 reads at ‘Background’

Referring to Government Regulation Number 48 of 2021, the Second Home Visa and ITAS allows foreigners to stay in the territory of Indonesia for a period of 5 years or 10 years without requiring a Sponsor, by depositing an Immigration Guarantee.

and at Chapter I, item 9

Proof of Fund is a sum of money, or property in the luxury category, owned by a foreigner, and is recognized as proof of having an immigration guarantee.

Therefore, since the 2 billion deposit, or the home ownership, is proof of having an immigration guarantee it follows that there is no need to use a Guarantor to apply for a Second Home visa, and the wording of the Government Regulation in regards to ‘depositing money in immigration’s account is not in effect — it is in your own account, and the interest (as low as it is) accrues to you, not the government.

Specifically the issue of a Guarantor is not entirely clear, and it might be that agents can put up the deposit for you (at what could be some considerable cost!).

Note that the word ‘luxury’ is just legal ‘noise’, and doesn’t refer to the furnishings, location, or anything — it’s met SOLELY by you having a ‘certificate of hak pakai’ in your name, which is done by buying a property costing above the relevant price limits. If you have a ‘sertifikat hak pakai’ (or deposit 2B) in your name you meet the requirements, and if you do not, then you don’t.

Existing retirement ITAS/ITAP holders, agents and not meeting the requirements

The retirement ITAS or ITAP no longer exists and is replaced by Second Home, which does not have sub-types such as ‘young person’ or ‘pensioner’. Everyone is in the same boat.

For current retirement ITAS/ITAP holders they will have a sponsor, an agent who charges a fee on top of the official fees, however they were not required to deposit any funds or own any property.

According to the circular:

existing retirement ITAS/ITAP holders whose ITAS/ITAP will expire before 22 June 2023 can let it expire and leave the country, or renew their ITAS/ITAP as ‘second home’ ITAS/ITAP, meeting the requirements discussed here
those ITAS/ITAP is still valid beyond 22 June 2023, must change their ITAS/ITAP to second home, presumably by 22 June 2023, but this is not clear
those who specifically have ‘unlimited’ ITAP have until 24 March 2023 to provide proof of fund (i.e. 2 billion deposit or property ownership), but do not need to formally apply to change their ITAP, unless they wish to be without a guarantor, in which case they (or any other existing retirement ITAS/ITAP holder) must obtain a consent letter from the current guarantor to effect this change.

There is a 30-day period after issue/change of status of ITAS/ITAP to report the ‘proof of fund’ (home ownership certificate or bank letter).

The Circular is ambiguous and sloppily drafted, however from the underlying law a ‘Guarantor’ is a substitute for an ‘Immigration Guarantee’, however from the Circular it appears possible that a ‘Guarantor’ can hold an ‘Immigration Guarantee’ on behalf of a foreigner.

This raises different possibilities:

the Guarantor holds 2 billion in cash for each guaranteed foreigner, in which case I would assume that they would require a fee of around 100 million per year per foreigner
the Guarantor can somehow guarantee multiple foreigners with the same Guarantee, in which case it would be cheaper than this
some other dodge is derived

If you meet the Second Home requirements, then it would generally be a good idea to ditch your current Guarantor, as it will make things cheaper in the long run. For a current retirement ITAS/ITAP holder, they will need to provide written permission for this, for which they will almost certainly charge you.

On the other hand, in principle at this point the Second Home visa means that many current retirement ITAS/ITAP holders would be unable to maintain their current ITAS/ITAP, since they might already have a house via ‘hak sewa’, which is not eligible.

In this case they will have certain options:

to invest 1.125 billion in new or existing PT PMA (limited company for foreign investment) as a shareholder, or 1 billion as a director. The fees for this are lower (3.75 million for 2 years or 2 million for 1 year for ITAS; after 3 years you can convert to ITAP costing 9.5 million total for 5 years (including 2 re-entry permit renewals), or 14.7 million for an unlimited period (including re-entry permits), and then 4.5 million (in three applications) for each 5 years), however in practice this involves investment, agents, etc., so this is not ‘DIY’, and actual costs will be higher. They can invite their spouse and under-age children, but not adult children or parents.
note that the are many crooked agents who will advertise ‘PT PMA’ services where you are simply added to a PT PMA as a shareholder but no actual business activity is performed. Jakarta immigration has deported several foreigners who use this scam, but in Bali there are many who do it, and so far apparently no action from immigration. As a a matter of principle a ‘PT PMA’ is for investing at least 10 billion rupiah in a company in Indonesia, where that 10 billion will include construction services but not land, unless the PT PMA is a real estate PT PMA. In theory regular investment reports are submitted to the BKPM and if the 10 billion is not realized sanctions are imposed which would essentially culminate in the business licence being cancelled (e.g., if you have set up a small restaurant investing only 2 billion, then the business licence should eventually be cancelled leaving the business unable to trade and your visa cancelled)
in addition, a PT PMA is not for hands-on work, if you are a director. You can ‘direct’, i.e. sit an office or tell people what to do.
a work visa typically won’t be an option has there is a maximum age of 55 years.
to marry an Indonesian in which case the headline costs are the same as for PT PMA, but DIY is possible (recommended), and adult children (of the Indonesian spouse) can also follow.
to use a succession of ‘visit visas’, leaving the country every six months, which is currently tolerated, but not exactly legally certain.

Reasons to choose the Second Home visa over other types

Indonesian immigration law typically creates a situation where a foreigner is dependent on their guarantor, who can essentially report them to immigration and have their stay permit cancelled at any time.

The second home visa is positive because:

it promotes safe land ownership, as opposed to uncertificatable leases
you have no guarantor, and therefore you cannot be subject to ‘removal by guarantor’
although the 2 billion deposit in a state-owned bank is not a smart option in the long term (low interest rates, doesn’t fulfil your housing needs), but it would allow you to reside legally in Indonesia and then use the money for buying a house at a later date, although it’s not yet clear the procedures for changing an immigration guarantee from a bank deposit to a property certificate
you can invite your adult children and your parents

Thus for example, compared to a situation where a foreigner marries an Indonesian citizen, it is normal that:

the land is in the Indonesian’s name, leaving the foreigner with nothing in event of divorce
the marriage is likely to collapse, and while there are provisions for those who have been married beyond 10 years to remain after divorce, if they hold ITAP, this won’t help everyone.

The problems at the moment are:

the real estate industry in Bali promotes the sale of 25 or 30-year ‘leases’, which can exchange hands for billions of rupiah, and which would be expensive or impossible (because of the unwillingness of the actual landowner to sell the underlying land rights) to convert to a certificatable hak pakai.
existing retirement permit holders are required to meet the new requirements to remain in Indonesia, whereas they may have spent billions of rupiah in Indonesia, yet not meet the (newly published) regulations.
although this is not a major issue, it is a consideration, the second home visa/ITAS/ITAP is certainly more expensive than a spouse of Indonesian visa in terms of the fees payable to immigration.