What the UGE is actually looking for

Spain’s rule sounds simple: the main applicant must show financial resources from their work activity of at least 200% of the Spanish minimum wage — for 2026, a practical benchmark of about €2,849 per month (full math in the income guide). But the operative words are the ones nobody quotes: the income should be recurring, documented, and connected to the employment relationship your visa is based on. The UGE is a document-review unit, not an equity analyst. It wants numbers that repeat monthly on official paper — contract, payslips, bank deposits, one coherent story.

Equity compensation is real money, but it doesn’t repeat monthly on official paper in the same way. That mismatch — not any rule that says “equity doesn’t count” — is the entire subject of this guide.

The comfortable case: your base clears the bar

At ~€2,849/month, the threshold is roughly $37,000–39,000 a year of base salary at typical exchange rates. If your base is $120,000, you clear it three times over before anyone mentions equity — and the correct strategy is beautifully boring: build the file on base salary alone. Contract, payslips, bank statements, employer letter. Your RSUs stay out of the conversation, the reviewer gets the simple repeating number they want, and nothing invites questions. Most tech W-2 cases I handle are this case. If that’s you, your real battles are elsewhere — the Certificate of Coverage and the employer letter.

The interesting case: base below, total comp far above

Now the startup profile: base $36,000, RSUs worth $150,000 vesting quarterly. Total comp doubles the threshold; base alone sits just under it. Can equity carry the file? Here’s the honest hierarchy of what works:

1. Vested RSUs that appear on your payroll (strongest)

When RSUs vest, U.S. payroll treats them as compensation: they show up on payslips as supplemental income and on your W-2 in Box 1. That is documented, employment-connected income — the kind of paper the UGE understands. A file can present base + regular quarterly vesting as combined recurring compensation, supported by: the grant agreement, the vesting schedule, 12 months of payslips showing the vest events, the W-2, and brokerage statements showing the shares landing.

2. Sold shares hitting your bank account (good reinforcement)

Bank statements showing vest-and-sell deposits every quarter turn an abstract schedule into visible cash flow. Combined with the payslips, the story becomes: this person is paid this much, this regularly — some in cash, some in stock that becomes cash on fixed dates.

3. Unvested grants (almost worthless)

A grant letter saying you’ll receive $150,000 of stock over four years is, to an immigration reviewer, a promise about the future — contingent on your employment, the stock price, and cliff dates. It can add color to a file. It cannot be the file.

4. The employer letter does heavy lifting

In equity-heavy cases I ask the employer letter to quantify compensation explicitly: base salary plus the equity cadence in plain numbers (“additionally receives restricted stock units vesting quarterly with an approximate annual value of $X”). A letter that names the numbers converts your vesting schedule from an exhibit into testimony.

Stock options are a weaker story

RSUs become income automatically on a calendar. Options are a right to buy — their value is speculative until exercised, and an unexercised option generates no payslip line at all. If options are a big share of your comp: exercised spreads documented through payroll can support a file like vested RSUs; unexercised grants, however valuable on paper, should be treated as zero for visa math. If your base doesn’t clear the bar without them, that’s a conversation to have before filing — sometimes the fix is timing (file after the next vest events build history), sometimes it’s savings as a cushion, sometimes it’s asking your employer to rebalance cash vs. equity, which happens more often than people think.

What I put in an equity-heavy file

  • Employment contract + employer letter quantifying base and equity cadence
  • 12 months of payslips — highlighting nothing; the vest lines speak
  • W-2 (Box 1 includes vested RSU income — a single official yearly number)
  • Grant agreement + vesting schedule
  • Brokerage statements (vests landing) and bank statements (sales deposited)
  • A one-paragraph cover explanation connecting the documents — reviewers reward files that explain themselves

The tax half of the equity question

Visa math is only half of it. Once you’re a Spanish tax resident, RSUs that vest while you live in Spain are Spanish taxable income — at your marginal rate, or at the flat 24% if the Beckham regime applies to your case (equity compensation is one of its classic use cases, and one of its trickiest). Vest dates, the election deadline, and your move date interact: the same vesting schedule can cost you very different amounts depending on when you become resident. This is precisely why my process puts the tax conversation at the start, with a referral to cross-border specialists who read vesting schedules for a living.

The five equity mistakes

  • Leading with total comp. If your base clears the bar, equity should stay quietly in the appendix — or out entirely.
  • Counting unvested grants. The UGE doesn’t underwrite your company’s stock.
  • Showing brokerage wealth instead of income. A $400k portfolio is savings; the requirement is work income. (Savings help as a cushion — they don’t replace the salary story.)
  • A vague employer letter. “Competitive compensation package” documents nothing. Numbers or silence.
  • Ignoring the vest-date tax bomb. Moving to Spain three weeks before a big vest, without planning, is an expensive way to learn about Spanish marginal rates.

The bottom line

RSUs count when they’ve become payroll; options count when they’ve become money; promises count for nothing. If your base clears ~€2,849/month, file on base and keep it boring. If it doesn’t but your vested equity history does, the file is buildable — it just has to be built deliberately, with the employer letter and twelve months of paper doing the talking. Not sure which side you’re on? The free two-minute assessment asks about exactly this, and my written follow-up will tell you — honestly — whether your equity story files today or needs two more quarters of vesting first.

Sources: Ministerio de Inclusión — UGE · Ley 28/2022 (BOE) · Agencia Tributaria. This guide is general information, not legal or tax advice. Last updated: July 2026.