Hi,

I would like to know all the steps for a future marriage in Brazil. My girlfriend from Sao Paulo insists us to live in her country. I heard that it's difficult and a lot of bureaucracy in getting the right to live in Brazil as a foreigner.If somebody can explain about my status there,etc. I would be very thankful.

Hi Chris - it's really very simple to get married in Brazil. I'm from London and was married here last year.

What you need to do is collate the following list of ORIGINAL documents and take them to the Brazilian Consulate in your country (state if you live in the USA) where they will be legaalized (stamped on the back to prove they are authentic)

1, Full Birth Certificate with parents names.

2, Certificate of non-impediment (a letter proving you are single and free to marry ) available from the bureau where marriages, births etc are registered in your home city. If you are divorced then you need your decree nici (instead, not as well as!)

3, Prove of residence in your home country (normally a letter from the local government or council where you pay city taxes or council tax.

4, Your passport

On arrival in Brazil you will have to get these papers (previously authorized at the Consulate) translated into Portuguese by a SWORN PUBLIC TRANSLATOR and then registered at the Cartorio for Titles and documents in the neighbourhood where you fiancee lives.

You then choose a civil registry cartorio where you want to get married and book a wedding by showing them the authourized, translated, registered documents along with your finacee's RNE (Identity card) and CPF and proof of residence. It should take about 3 weeks to arrange a wedding from the time of booking the cartorio to the actual ceremony. If you can't speak or understand Portuguese you really should have an official translator (the law!) but in reality as the only words you have to say are 'Eu Aceito' (I do) then simply having you finacee squeeze your hand at the appropriate time worked for me! Good luck.

Here is a link to a wedding cartorio in Rio - I attach this just so you can cross-check the information. I also reccommend that you go the consular website for your country/state to check the information from them also

Hi Chris. It's quite easy to get married in Brazil. Go the website of the civil registry cartorio where you intend to get married and there you will see a list of documents that you need to have. Before you come to Brazil get these documents legalized at the Brazilian Consulate in your country/state and then have them translated by a public translator in Brazil and registered at the tiles and documents cartorio in your financee's local neighbourhood. Once you have done this you can take them to the civil registry cartorio to book a wedding. You can get married any any civil registry cartorio so choose one that is nice for wedding and close to where your fiancee lives.

If you haven't chosen a cartorio yet, then have a look at the website of the cartorio where I was married as a general reference as they all tend to operate in the same way.

http://www.cartoriocatete.com.br/casamentos.asp


It's worth checking out the Consular website in your state for any similar information and if you intend to apply for permanancia to live in Brazil based on marriage to a BR citizen then you will have to get a police record certificate (or FBI record) that needs to be legalized at the consulate prior to you arriving and then translated here in Brazil.