DefesaLegal.pt is the professional website led by Jorge Ferraz, a Portuguese lawyer admitted to the Portuguese Bar since 2002, focused on legal assistance to private clients, families, investors and companies in immigration, nationality, international tax coordination, real estate and investment matters in Portugal.
Two words that capture the method. Rigour is the weight given to every matter — reading the file in full, refusing shortcuts, writing concisely. Care is the attention the client is owed by the firm for the duration of the case.
Half of our clients live outside Portugal. The other half are Portuguese clients dealing with matters that cross borders. The firm was built to serve both with the same diligence.
We opened the firm in 2018, two partners with more than two decades of individual experience in Portuguese law, with the simple idea of not growing except where real need required it. Eight years on we have kept to that idea: four lawyers, one trainee lawyer and two assistants, with offices in Porto and Lisbon.
We are governed by the Statute of the Portuguese Bar Association (Law 145/2015) and by Law 6/2024 on legal advertising. We do not speak of success rates, do not draw comparisons with other firms and do not solicit clients — professional conduct rules are not an aesthetic constraint, they are how this profession is practised with dignity.
The full file is read by the responsible partner before the first reply.
One-page drafts, three-page memoranda, opinions kept to the minimum length needed.
Internal and statutory deadlines on every matter. Reviewed fortnightly.
The lawyer who signs is the lawyer who runs the matter. There are no invisible teams drafting in the background — every piece produced by the firm has a named author available to the client who received it.
The initial consultation usually lasts 25 minutes, in person in Porto or by video call, and is used to understand the context of the case, identify the main risks and outline a work proposal to protect the client's interests.