Dan Merriam
I moved to the Caribbean in 2020 and started my own citizenship application in 2021. I have been the client in the process my team and I now run.
I filed my own application before I ever handled anyone else’s.
In 2021 I started the process of acquiring citizenship of Antigua and Barbuda through the contribution route — the donation, not the real estate, despite selling real estate for a living. It was granted in 2022. I assembled the source-of-funds file myself, answered the queries and waited on a government that moves at its own speed. The year before, I had sold a Canadian portfolio, left, and paid a departure-tax bill larger than the one I budgeted for. Most of what my team and I tell families about sequence and disclosure came out of that file rather than a brochure.
& residency in the past 18 months
region in the past 18 months
What I did before I advised anyone else to do it
I began acquiring real estate in Hamilton, Ontario in 2011 — small multi-family buildings nobody else wanted to underwrite. Over the following decade that became more than 50,000 square feet of residential and commercial space worth over $15 million. The most expensive lesson had nothing to do with price: my single largest loss came from how slowly landlord-tenant disputes were resolved, a shift in the operating environment I had never priced. It was also the point at which I noticed that everything I owned sat in one country, one currency and one legal system.
Selling the portfolio was the straightforward half. The harder half was arriving without a local network and building one island by island — the attorney in Nevis who answers on a Sunday, the project manager who gives an honest completion date, the banker who will open an account for a non-resident. That network became the practice, and it is the part of this work that cannot be assembled quickly. The longer version: why I left Canada at 35 and what the departure tax actually cost me.
How I work
Here is the sequence, in the order it happens. It is deliberately front-loaded: almost every decision that saves money is made before anything is signed.
The first call
Short, candid and free. We establish what you are solving for — mobility, a base, a tax position, somewhere to put capital — and we decide together whether working with my team is the right fit. It is a two-way judgement, and some calls end with me pointing you elsewhere.
The shortlist
Jurisdiction before property, always. I have watched buyers commit to a villa and then learn it was never approved for the program they wanted. Country first, then the route — contribution or real estate — then buildings. It lands in a private dataroom for the client: two or three real options, with the case against each written beside the case for.
Before you fly
We prepare the trip so it is worth taking. Introductions are arranged in advance, showings and site tours booked around them, and my team assists with accommodation and inter-island travel. By the time you land I have read the completion record rather than the sales deck — the method is in my off-plan checklist.
The site visit
My team and I walk the site before you fly, then walk it again with you. We live here, so it is not a trip anyone has to justify. It buys what photographs cannot carry: what is next door, what the road in is like in September rather than February, and which renderings correspond to poured concrete.
Due diligence and the file
Applications almost never fail on the money. They fail on a gap in the story — an old visa refusal from an unrelated country, a dissolved directorship, a dependant added late — so we over-disclose before a due-diligence firm finds it. It is also where you are introduced to vetted service providers and industry professionals — attorneys, authorised agents, accountants, bankers — people my team has worked beside on live files, not names from a directory.
Filing and the wait
The residency and/or citizenship by investment application is filed through an authorised agent in the country. On the comparison tables, St. Kitts & Nevis, Grenada, Dominica and St. Lucia run four to six months and Antigua & Barbuda 12 to 16 — and in practice files run longer than the marketed three-to-six-month line. I would rather say so at the start than apologise in month nine. Detail: costs, timelines and due diligence.
Closing and title
Closing runs through a vetted service provider whose job is one thing: making certain you take clear and marketable title. Searches are run, consents obtained where a purchase needs them, and the terms read before anything is wired.
After the passport
Programs attach obligations that outlive the ceremony: minimum hold periods before a qualifying property can be resold, presence requirements across the first years of citizenship, renewal dates on passports and residency cards. My team tracks those dates, because nobody remembers a five-year obligation in year four.
Who I represent
My team and I work closely with some of the largest real-estate developers and international investment-migration firms in the industry. My fiduciary duty lies with my clients. I say so in writing at the start of a file, and everything else on this page runs back to it.
I walk the site before you fly and tell you what I saw, including the parts easier to leave out; if a project has been approved for years and built very little, that is what you will hear. No project on our list pays a premium to sit at the top of a shortlist, and where I earn a commission you will know the arrangement before you see a unit. I will also tell you when the answer is no — I have talked families out of files that would have paid me, sometimes because nobody could say who controlled the escrow account and what released it. The same candour applies to the region itself: three of the five citizenship islands tax residents on income, and visa-free access runs from 145 destinations to 155 depending on the program.
Dan Merriam & Associates
The practice is a team of real-estate professionals, investment-migration agents and lawyers working across the Eastern Caribbean. Those disciplines sit together deliberately, because the parts of a transaction that should never be improvised — the citizenship filing, the title work, the government consents, the ownership structure — are exactly the parts that usually end up spread across four firms who have never spoken to each other.
You deal with me. Every enquiry comes to me — I read them and I answer them — and the team comes in once there is something real to do. I take the first call, walk the site, read the developer’s numbers and tell you when a deal is wrong; my colleagues handle the machinery you should never have to chase. We are resident in the region rather than visiting it, which is why a site inspection is a drive for us rather than a flight. Where a mandate runs past what we do — structuring executed rather than designed, or a family-governance framework — I introduce a dedicated specialist private-capital practice and stay on the real-estate and citizenship side myself. That is the shape of the private-client advisory work, and who it is built for is set out separately.
What working with us covers
- Program selection across all five Caribbean citizenship routes and the region’s residency options
- Property search, site inspection and developer diligence, including inventory that is not publicly listed
- A private dataroom holding the shortlist, with the case against each option beside the case for
- Application file preparation and disclosure strategy, filed through an authorised agent
- Closing coordination with a vetted service provider — searches, consents, clear and marketable title
- Hold periods, presence requirements and renewal dates tracked after the passport is issued
Program rules, fees and processing times change frequently, and every figure above is indicative. The current position is confirmed on your file before anything is acted on.
Frequently asked questions
Do you only work in St. Kitts & Nevis?
No. My office is at Four Seasons Nevis, but the practice runs across St. Kitts & Nevis, Antigua & Barbuda, Dominica, St. Lucia, Grenada and Barbados. If the honest answer is an island where I hold no listings, that is still the answer.
What does working with us cost?
The first call is free and carries no obligation. On a property purchase I am generally paid a commission out of the transaction in the ordinary way, and you will know the arrangement before you see a unit. If you want structured investment and relocation advisory, I often work on a retainer basis.
Can you help if I am not buying property?
Yes. I took the contribution route to my own citizenship, despite selling real estate for a living. Donation routes are frequently cleaner, faster and cheaper than buying, and I say so when they are — see donation versus real estate.
Do I still file taxes at home if I take a Caribbean passport?
US citizens remain taxed by the United States on worldwide income regardless of a second citizenship — none of the five Caribbean programs has a US income tax treaty. For Canadian, British and European families the test is residence rather than citizenship, so genuinely leaving ends the claim — eventually, and at a price on the way out. Settle it with your own cross-border counsel.
How long does this actually take?
Four to six months for St. Kitts & Nevis, Grenada, Dominica and St. Lucia, and 12 to 16 months for Antigua & Barbuda — and in practice, longer, because due-diligence capacity has not scaled with application volume.
Are you the developer’s agent, or mine?
Yours. My team and I work closely with some of the largest developers in the region, and my fiduciary duty lies with my clients — in writing, at the start of a file. I have talked families out of transactions that would have paid me.
Who actually does the work — you or your team?
Both, and the split is fixed. Every enquiry comes to me and I answer it personally. I take the first call, walk the sites and make the recommendations. My colleagues handle the machinery: the due-diligence file, the application, island counsel and the dates that matter afterwards.
Who I work with
Global families buying a second citizenship and a home in the same decision
Entrepreneurs and founders diversifying out of one country and one currency
Family offices underwriting Caribbean property for a principal
One network, and what it opens.
Dan Merriam & Associates works with Sotheby’s International Realty. What that changes for a client.
The reach
More than 1,100 offices in 86 countries and territories, and over 26,100 affiliated sales associates. A question about a market my team does not cover personally is a call to a colleague, not a referral into the dark.
Inventory before the portal
The affiliation is how my clients see Eastern Caribbean property that never reaches a public search page — quiet listings, pre-release phases, owners who will only sell discreetly. The public book is a fraction of it.
Buyers who live somewhere else
The buyer for a residence in Nevis or Antigua is almost never on the island. The network puts a Caribbean asset in front of associates in New York, London and Dubai, and works in reverse when a client is selling elsewhere.
A working affiliation — and the reason a client’s search is never limited to one office’s inventory.
Quoted in the press.
Journalists come to me for a read on this region. These are the lines that ran.
“The island of Nevis flies under the radar for most, but that is starting to change rapidly.”
Travel + Leisure, April 2026 · Read the article
“Over the past year, we’ve seen a huge shift from donation-based citizenship to real estate–based citizenship.”
Caribbean Journal, October 2025 · Read the article
“Focusing on jurisdiction first is a better approach than starting to look for property only to realize it’s not approved for Citizenship by Investment.”
Veranda, July 2025 · Read the article
In their words.
Identified by role and country at their request — discretion is most of what people are buying here.
Start a conversation.
Tell me what you are looking for. Every enquiry comes to me directly — I read them and I answer them.
The Eastern Caribbean