What AIMA accepts as proof of address when your name is not on the lease
Renting a room, or living in a flat leased by someone else, means the document AIMA wants has another person's name on it. There is a route for that: a sworn declaration carrying the land-registry number and the owner's NIF, plus a tax-domicile certificate issued in the last 30 days.
One detail catches people out at an AIMA appointment, and it is not the queue. It is proof of accommodation. If you own the flat, the whole thing takes a minute. If you rent a room in a shared house, live with a relative, or hold a tenancy signed by somebody else, you have a genuine problem: the document AIMA wants to see has another person’s name across the top of it.
The good news is that a route exists for precisely that situation. The bad news is that it needs two documents nobody keeps in a drawer, and one of them expires quickly.
The one thing everybody has to bring
Before anything else, proof of accommodation always requires a declaration from you, on your word of honour, giving your residential address and stating the legal basis on which you are entitled to use the property. Where you live, and on what footing. The template sits in the forms and templates section of AIMA’s website, and it is not optional. Everything else attaches to it.
After that, the document depends on your circumstances.
If you own the property or hold usufruct, you supply the access code to the permanent land registry certificate, or a valid paper certificate.
If you rent and you are named in the lease, you supply the lease showing your name and the rent receipt for the previous month. Note the wording: the previous month, not any receipt you happen to have.
If you live under a comodato, meaning a property lent to you rent-free, you supply the comodato contract and a valid permanent land registry certificate.
When your name is on no contract at all
This is the case that applies to far more people than you would think, and AIMA handles it separately. If you are not identified in either the lease or the comodato, you have to bring two things to the appointment on the day itself.
The first is a declaration from you, on your word of honour and under criminal liability for false statements, stating that you genuinely live at that address, the land-registry description number of the property, the basis on which you live there, and the full name plus NIF or NIPC of the owner who gave you the use of the place.
The second is a certificate issued by the tax authority showing your tax domicile, dated less than 30 days before.
Read that list twice, because it has practical consequences. You need the property’s land-registry description number, which is not the same as the address and which usually only the landlord or owner has to hand. You need their tax number. And you need your own tax domicile to be registered at that address, because the tax certificate will state exactly where the Finanças believe you live. If your fiscal address is still the flat you left two years ago, that certificate works against you.
The 30-day window is not a technicality either. A certificate pulled in February will not carry an appointment in April. Request it once your slot is confirmed, not before.
Two flat refusals worth knowing
The first is short and final. Residence certificates issued by a junta de freguesia are not accepted as proof. That is probably the single most useful line on this page, because the junta certificate is quick, cheap and the first thing many people are told to get. It does not work.
The second is quieter. AIMA says it will analyse the number of residents declared per property. Put plainly: if a lot of declarations name the same address, that gets noticed. Living in a six-bedroom shared house does not put you in breach of anything, but it does put you at an address the agency has reason to look at closely.
Students have their own options
For accommodation tied to vocational, secondary or higher education, alternatives exist. You can present the lease signed between the school and a private entity, together with a certified declaration naming individually the students who actually live there, if the contract itself does not name them. Alternatively a declaration from the educational institution will do, sworn and duly certified, attesting to the individual residence of the student. And anyone in a university hall can present a certificate from the higher education institution confirming an entitlement to accommodation.
What to do this week
If you have an appointment booked, run three checks. Confirm whether your name appears on the lease, and if it does not, ask the owner now for the land-registry number and their NIF, because that can take days to come back. Check your tax domicile on the Portal das Finanças and correct it if it is out of date. And leave the tax certificate request until the weeks immediately before the appointment, inside the 30-day window.
The full and current list is in AIMA’s own note on proof of accommodation. For the wider process, we have already covered what changed in the proof-of-address rules in 2026.
Frequently asked questions
Does a junta de freguesia certificate count as proof of accommodation?
No. AIMA states explicitly that certificates issued by juntas de freguesia are not accepted as proof of accommodation.
Which rent receipt do I need to bring?
The one for the month before your appointment, and the lease has to identify you. A receipt three months old does not meet the requirement.
Does the tax domicile certificate expire?
Yes. It has to have been issued less than 30 days earlier and to clearly identify your tax domicile.
I live in a flat lent to me by a relative. What do I need?
If there is a comodato contract and your name is on it, you bring that contract plus the permanent land registry certificate. If your name is not on it, you fall under the sworn declaration route plus the tax domicile certificate.
Image: GualdimG / Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 4.0)
