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SEF office experiance

8 years ago
Hello,
My wife and I are arriving in Lagos in late October. We are Canadian and are trying to get a residence permit to experience life in Portugal. Lagos is a temporary stop for us to rest up a bit and then we are hoping o find a nice little place in Lisbon. I have read the countless tales on this site and others regarding the visa and our adventure is similar, yet different.
We went to the Vancouver consulate as we were from western Canada and told "there is no residence visas now".
Apparently, just that morning, he consulate was told to issue only Schengen visas to Canadians wanting a residence visa! Even when we questioned this we were told that the SEF offices just wanted our applications in the system and to go to an SEF office asap upon arrival in Portugal and ask for a residence visa.

My question is this; Is there an SEF office which someone has had exceptionally good luck dealing with in either the Algarve or Lisbon? Is a translator necessary and/ or recommended?
Thanks in advance to anyone who answers.
Phil

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