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This is not a sanctions question, and the difference matters
Can a Russian citizen buy a house, a condominium, or commercial property in the United States? A few years ago the answer usually began and ended with a sanctions check. That is no longer sufficient. It is now also necessary to establish where the property is located, where the buyer lives, what his immigration status is, and, if the purchase is made through a company, who owns and controls that company.
Over the past several years, many states have enacted laws restricting foreign ownership of real property. Most of those laws concern agricultural land, but several states have gone considerably further and restricted acquisitions by persons and entities connected to countries that US law treats as foreign adversaries or as countries of particular concern. Russia is among the states covered by a number of these laws.
These state statutes should not be confused with federal economic sanctions. Sanctions are federal. They are administered by the Office of Foreign Assets Control of the US Department of the Treasury (OFAC). A sanctions program may restrict dealings with named persons and entities, block particular property, and prohibit specified categories of transactions. Russian citizenship by itself does not mean that a person is subject to OFAC sanctions.
The property restrictions discussed in this article are creatures of state law. They differ from one another in the persons and entities they reach, the categories of property they cover, and the criteria by which they define a connection to a foreign state.
A clean sanctions screen therefore does not establish that a transaction is permitted under the law of the state where the property sits. The reverse is equally true: the absence of state property bans for Russian citizens in a given state does not remove the need for a separate sanctions analysis.
Domicile, citizenship, and immigration status
No single criterion applies across all states. Depending on the statute, the relevant factor may be citizenship, domicile, immigration status, a company’s state of incorporation, its ownership and control structure, or, in some cases, a connection between the buyer and a foreign government.
Domicile is not simply where a person happens to live, or the address on his documents. In general terms, it is the place a person treats as his permanent home and to which he intends to return. Texas wrote its own definition into the statute: the “true, fixed, and permanent home and principal residence” to which the individual intends to return whenever absent.
In Florida, domicile is one of the key criteria for an individual. A Russian citizen does not become a foreign principal by reason of Russian citizenship alone; his domicile is among the factors that matter.
In other states, citizenship can carry independent weight. The Texas statute, for example, reaches a citizen of a designated country in certain circumstances even where that person is domiciled elsewhere.
Status as a US citizen or lawful permanent resident is expressly carved out of many of the statutes discussed here. That should not be generalized into a universal rule across all states: the application of any particular restriction has to be verified under the law of the state in which the property is located.
A temporary visa provides no universal exemption either. Several statutes go further and set out separate rules for holders of non-immigrant visas.
Texas: one of the broadest prohibitions
Texas SB 17 has been in force since 1 September 2025, codified as Subchapter H, Chapter 5, Texas Property Code §§ 5.251-5.259. It prohibits certain individuals and entities connected to designated countries from acquiring interests in real property in the state.
A designated country is, among others, a country identified by the Director of National Intelligence as a threat to US national security in at least one of the three most recent Annual Threat Assessments of the US Intelligence Community. The Governor of Texas may designate additional countries in the manner the statute provides. Russia is among the countries so designated.
The definition of real property is drawn extremely broadly. It expressly covers agricultural land, commercial, industrial and residential property, groundwater, mines and quarries, minerals in place, standing timber and water rights. Leases of less than one year are expressly excluded, which means a leasehold interest of one year or more is potentially within the statute.
For individuals, § 5.253(4) sets out several independent grounds on which the prohibition may apply. It may reach a person who:
- Is domiciled in a designated country;
- Is a citizen of a designated country and is domiciled outside the United States in another country whose citizenship he has not yet obtained;
- Is a citizen of a designated country and is unlawfully present in the United States;
- Is a citizen of a country other than the United States and is acting as an agent of, or on behalf of, a designated country; or
- Is a member of the ruling political party, or a division of it, in a designated country.
The statute expressly excludes US citizens and lawful permanent residents. There is also an exclusion for certain companies and organizations owned or controlled by such persons, subject to the further conditions the statute imposes.
A narrower exception exists for a person domiciled in a designated country who is nevertheless lawfully present and residing in the United States at the time of acquisition: that person may acquire residential property intended for use as his residence homestead. Investment property does not fall within the exception.
The consequences of a violation are serious. Against a company or other entity, a court may impose a civil penalty equal to the greater of $250,000 or 50 percent of the market value of the relevant interest in the property. For an individual within § 5.253(4), an intentional or knowing violation is a state jail felony. The Texas Attorney General may also bring an in rem action, which can result in the sale or other forced divestiture of an unlawfully acquired interest.
The statute is not retroactive as to acquisitions: the new restrictions apply to purchases and other acquisitions of an interest in real property made on or after 1 September 2025.
What this means for a Russian buyer
For a Russian citizen the outcome depends on the particular facts.
- You live in Russia and are domiciled there. The Texas prohibition reaches you.
- You have relocated to, say, the UAE, Turkey or Cyprus and are domiciled there, but have not obtained the citizenship of that country. Russian citizenship continues to matter: § 5.253(4)(B) may keep the prohibition in place.
- You have obtained the citizenship of the country in which you are domiciled. Russian citizenship by itself no longer triggers § 5.253(4)(B). It remains necessary to check whether any of the other grounds applies to the buyer.
- You live lawfully in the United States and are domiciled here. The fact of Russian citizenship does not automatically mean that § 5.253(4) prohibits the purchase. The outcome still turns on the particular facts, including immigration status and the absence of other statutory grounds.
A purchase through a US company also requires separate analysis. Registering an LLC or a corporation does not by itself remove the restriction. State statutes may look through to direct or indirect foreign ownership and control, and both the criteria and the thresholds vary substantially between states.
The structure of the transaction therefore has to be analyzed before the contract is signed. Where a violation surfaces only after closing, the consequences can include monetary penalties, litigation and forced divestiture of the property.
Florida, Indiana and Georgia: three different models
Florida
Florida SB 264 (Fla. Stat. §§ 692.201-692.205; the principal restrictions have applied since 1 July 2023) establishes several regimes. For foreign principals from foreign countries of concern, a category that expressly includes Russia, the statute prohibits acquisition of agricultural land and of real property on or within ten miles of a military installation or a critical infrastructure facility.
A separate and considerably broader regime is set out in § 692.204 for persons and entities connected to the People’s Republic of China. As a general rule, therefore, an ordinary condominium in Miami, or a house outside the relevant zones that is not agricultural land, does not fall within these restrictions for a Russian buyer merely because of his connection to Russia.
For an individual, the definition of foreign principal in § 692.201 turns first on domicile: it covers a person domiciled in a foreign country of concern who is neither a US citizen nor a lawful permanent resident. Russian citizenship alone is not enough to bring an individual within that category.
The definition also reaches foreign governments, political parties, certain foreign entities and certain structures controlled by those persons. A purchase through a company therefore calls for its own analysis of ownership and control.
Indiana
Senate Enrolled Act 256, in force since 1 July 2026, substantially expanded Indiana’s restrictions on real property and foreign adversaries. For persons and entities within the statutory definition of a prohibited person, the Act imposes broad restrictions on acquiring real property. Russian citizenship or domicile in Russia may carry independent weight, although the statute provides a number of exceptions, including by reference to US citizenship, lawful permanent resident status, and other circumstances.
The Act also regulates leasehold interests. For a person within the prohibition, leasing non-residential property is restricted, while residential leases are permitted for terms not exceeding twenty-four months.
A narrow exception allows certain holders of a valid non-immigrant visa to acquire residential property. Among other conditions, the property must be intended for single-family residential use, the parcel must not exceed half an acre, the visa must remain valid for more than twelve months after the acquisition, and the buyer must not be acting as an agent of a foreign adversary. In Indiana, unlike Florida, it is therefore not enough to conclude that a Russian citizen in fact lives outside Russia.
Georgia
SB 420, codified at O.C.G.A. § 2-1-7 and in force since 1 July 2024, uses a different model. It prohibits certain nonresident aliens from acquiring a possessory interest in agricultural land, and in land within ten miles of a military base, military installation, or military airport. Residential property is expressly excluded from the prohibition.
The definition of nonresident alien as applied to an individual is considerably narrower than “a Russian citizen.” Beyond the absence of US citizenship or legal resident status, the statute requires, among other things, that the person be an agent of a government the United States has designated a foreign adversary, and that he meets the statutory criteria for physical absence from the United States or from Georgia.
Separate rules apply to business entities. A US company may fall within the definition of nonresident alien where at least 25 percent of its owners are business entities domiciled in a foreign-adversary country.
A nonresident alien who already held a relevant possessory interest on 30 June 2024 must divest it by 30 June 2027. Other acquisition routes carry different deadlines: an interest acquired by inheritance must be divested within one year, and an interest acquired through collection of a debt or enforcement of a lien within two years.
The federal level: no ban, but reporting, and one rule now in litigation
Twenty-nine states currently restrict foreign ownership of, or investment in, private agricultural land in one form or another. In recent years, several have extended those restrictions to land near military installations and critical infrastructure, or to broader categories of real property.
There is no federal prohibition in force on the acquisition of real property by Russian citizens. Proposals to restrict acquisitions of American land by persons and entities connected to foreign adversaries are before Congress. In 2026, the House of Representatives passed the Farm, Food, and National Security Act, which contains provisions on foreign investment in agricultural land, but as of September 2026, no nationwide prohibition comparable to the Texas or Indiana statutes has been enacted.
Federal reporting on foreign ownership of agricultural land, by contrast, is long established. The Agricultural Foreign Investment Disclosure Act of 1978 (AFIDA) requires covered foreign persons and entities to report acquisitions, dispositions, and holdings of certain interests in US agricultural land to the Department of Agriculture. A report on an acquisition or disposition is generally due within 90 days. In 2026, the USDA launched an electronic portal for these filings.
The Residential Real Estate Rule of the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network of the US Department of the Treasury (FinCEN) is a separate story. The rule was intended to create a nationwide reporting system for certain transfers of residential property to legal entities and trusts where the transaction is not financed by a financial institution subject to the relevant anti-money-laundering and suspicious activity reporting requirements. It carried no minimum value threshold, and the obligation to file Real Estate Reports was to apply to covered transactions closing on or after 1 March 2026.
On 19 March 2026, however, the US District Court for the Eastern District of Texas vacated the Residential Real Estate Rule in Flowers Title Companies, LLC v. Bessent, holding that FinCEN lacked the statutory authority under the Bank Secrecy Act to adopt it. FinCEN, together with the Department of Justice, appealed to the Fifth Circuit in May 2026. The picture is complicated by the fact that other district courts considering similar challenges have reached the opposite conclusion and upheld the rule.
While the vacatur remains in force, Real Estate Reports are not required, and no liability arises for failing to file them. FinCEN has also confirmed that if the decision is later reversed and the rule takes effect again, reports will not have to be filed retroactively for transactions closed while the court order was in force.
So a purchase of a house through a US company using the buyer’s own funds does not, at present, mean that information about the beneficial owner’s citizenship will reach FinCEN under the Residential Real Estate Rule. The fate of the rule is worth following: the outcome of the appeal could change the position for future transactions.
The tax consequences of a subsequent sale, including possible FIRPTA withholding, sanctions screening by the parties to the transaction, evidence of source of funds, and non-resident financing are separate questions, and we will take them up in the next article.
