Citizenship-by-investment, long the preserve of the superrich, is drawing a growing share of middle-class Americans, according to new data from a Malta-based consultancy that has spent 20 years in the investment migration business.

Immigrant Invest shared figures with Business Insider showing that salaried professionals and retirees now account for 25% of its consultation calls with US-based clients, up from roughly 15% in the same period of 2025. The firm analyzed 450 calls with US-based clients between January and July 2026 and compared the results with data from the same months a year earlier.

The new cohort includes doctors, tech workers, academics, real estate brokers, lawyers, and retirees using personal savings. At the same time, the firm's traditional core clientele — ultrawealthy investors, entrepreneurs, and business owners — has shrunk from roughly 50% of US consultation calls in 2025 to about 40% in 2026.

Programme prices stay flat, demand climbs

Pavel Reshetnikov, a consultant at Immigrant Invest, told Business Insider that the cost of citizenship programmes has stayed relatively stable in recent years. That stability, he suggests, means more Americans with savings are seeking a "Plan B" amid heightened political division in the United States and global geopolitical volatility — not because passports have become cheaper.

The most popular options among the firm's US clients are Caribbean citizenship-by-investment programmes with low six-figure price tags. Grenada's programme requires a donation of more than $235,000 to the National Transformation Fund, or a real-estate investment of over $270,000. St Kitts and Nevis sets its contribution at a minimum of $250,000, or an investment of more than $325,000 in local real estate.

Cheaper routes exist. São Tomé and Príncipe, an island nation off the west coast of Africa, offers citizenship-by-investment starting at $90,000. Vanuatu, in the South Pacific, starts at $130,000.

Insurance, not emigration

Henley & Partners, one of the world's largest citizenship-by-investment advisory firms, reported in its 2026 Private Wealth Migration Report that demand from US clients nearly doubled in 2025 compared with the previous year. Most of those clients were not planning an imminent move.

"The great majority are US-Americans living in the USA, rather than expatriates already abroad, and they have no intention of leaving, or at least not yet," Basil Mohr-Elzeki, Henley & Partners' head of private clients in the Americas, said in the report.

Immigrant Invest said that as recently as 2021, Americans showed little interest in its citizenship-by-investment programmes, and middle-class clients were particularly rare. "Five years ago, I think it was just a very, very small percentage of US clients," Reshetnikov said. "Now it's a completely different story."

Demand began picking up in early 2025, around the time President Donald Trump took office. US-based clients have since become one of the firm's largest segments, accounting for as much as 28% of consultations in any given month.

For many of these Americans, the appeal lies less in leaving the US than in knowing they could. "They would like to have an option and insurance for the whole family to move somewhere very quickly," said Aleksandr Razinkov, who handles press relations for Immigrant Invest.

What changes for applicants

The shift does not reflect any change in programme rules or eligibility thresholds. Contribution floors, real-estate minimums, and processing structures of the main citizenship-by-investment programmes remain as listed above, and costs have held relatively steady, according to Immigrant Invest.

One rule that does not change: acquiring a second citizenship generally does not eliminate US tax obligations for American citizens. What an additional passport offers is the freedom to live, travel, and work abroad.

Second passports have not suddenly become more affordable. But for a growing group of affluent American professionals, a "Plan B" passport has become something worth spending their savings on.