NIE Number Fast (Acquired in 2025)

I never worked in law. I never worked in government.
Yet I ended up building a legal-doc startup in Spain that made €2.5M in revenue… all starting from my dad’s living room.

It began in October 2021. I needed a NIE number—Spain’s tax ID for foreigners. Without it, you can’t do much: buy a house, open a bank account, set up utilities.

The process? A nightmare. You either waited months through the embassy, or you flew to Spain, spent thousands, and prayed you spoke enough Spanish to survive the police bureaucracy.
There had to be another way.

Connecting the Dots

Here’s where life’s micro-moments matter.

A while earlier, a friend had told me about his business helping people get visas for Vietnam. His trick? Someone on the ground who could handle paperwork while clients stayed at home.
At the time, it didn’t feel important. Just another interesting story.

But when I was stuck needing my own NIE number, that memory came back. And suddenly, the dots connected.
If it works for Vietnam visas, why not for Spain?

So I tested it. With a power of attorney, I asked my dad, who lived in Spain, to apply for me. A few days later, the NIE number arrived. It worked.

That was the spark.

Lesson #1: The world is made of tiny experiences. Curiosity and paying attention turn those micro-moments into opportunities.

Going All In

At 22, I didn’t have much savings. But I had conviction.

That weekend, I locked myself in. Built a website. Wrote out the process. Launched Google Ads. All in two days.

It was risky. If it failed, I’d burn money I couldn’t afford to lose.
But it worked.

Day 1: two sales worth €500+.
Day 2: four more.
Month 1: €4,447.
Month 3: €12,100.
Month 6: €23,000.
By month 12: €59,600.

The “side hustle” had become a machine.

And for my dad, 63 at the time, still hauling bricks under the Spanish sun, it was life-changing. Instead of construction sites, he was now processing documents from his living room.

Lesson #2: Taking risks when you have little is terrifying. But sometimes, it’s the only way to create transformation.

The Chaos Nobody Sees

From the outside, it looked simple: get notarised paperwork, file it in Spain, and deliver the NIE number.

In reality, it was chaos. Every police station had its own unwritten rules. One rejected a form over a stamp. Another overformatting. A third demanded paperwork we’d never heard of.

The phones rang nonstop:
“Why isn’t this accepted?”
“When will my number be ready?”
“Do you even know what you’re doing?”

Truth? We were figuring it out live.

Most would have quit there. In fact, competitors who copied us did. They thought it was easy money until they hit the bureaucracy.
We didn’t quit. Every failure became a lesson. Over time, we built knowledge no one else had—how to prepare clients so nothing got rejected, which notaries were reliable, which police stations cared about which details.

We turned chaos into a playbook. That made us unbeatable.

The Numbers Surprise

When I set it up, I thought maybe, maybe we could hit €10k/month. I had run the numbers in Google’s Keyword Planner: a few thousand searches per month, maybe 2% conversion if I was lucky.

But my assumptions were useless.

Reality was twice as good. Double the search volume, double the click-through-rate, double the conversions.

Instead of €10k/month, we hit €60k/month within a year.

Lesson #3: Predictions are worthless in the early days. You don’t know until you launch.

The Hidden Dangers

By 2025, NIE Number Fast had served 9,654 clients and generated €2.5M in revenue.
I used to worry about competitors. But they came, copied, and quit. They couldn’t copy our scars, reviews, or knowledge.

I feared the government might digitize the process. They didn’t.

The real danger came from where I least expected.

First, Google. They banned ads for government-related documents. Overnight, half our revenue disappeared.
Then the Spanish police. One by one, they stopped accepting third-party applications. Until the very last station shut us out.

Our revenue went from €60k/month to zero overnight. Not a dip. Not a slowdown. A blackout.

Lesson #4: The danger is rarely where you think it is. Competitors won’t kill you. Platforms and regulators will.

The Exit

At that moment, most would have filed for bankruptcy. As an SL, I wasn’t personally liable. Walking away was an option.

But I couldn’t. Not with employees relying on salaries. Not with 100+ active client cases worth €30k still in progress.

So I picked up the phone. Called competitors, sometimes as a mystery shopper, to see if they could deliver. Then pitched them the business.

And I bluffed. Hard. I told each one that multiple buyers were circling. In reality, there were two lukewarm maybes.

But the bluff worked. One leaned in. Within days, we had a deal.

Clients were protected. Employees were compensated fairly. And we walked away not with nothing, but with an exit. And not just any exit: a smart one.

I negotiated that we would continue to receive a share of future profits for a year. For the buyer, it was low-risk. For us, it meant we didn’t just survive, we left with upside.

Lesson #5: Negotiation is rarely about what’s on the table. It’s about structuring the deal so both sides win.

Lessons That Last

From weekend project to €2.5M in revenue. From my dad’s living room to nearly 10,000 clients. From explosive growth to sudden collapse.
Here’s what I learned:

• Connect the dots. The best ideas come from random conversations and micro-moments. Stay curious.
• Take risks. At 22, I went all in with no savings. It changed my life.
• Predictions are useless. Spreadsheets don’t decide the market. Reality does.
• The danger isn’t where you expect. Competitors won’t kill you. Regulators and platforms will.
• Specific knowledge compounds. Every mistake turned into knowledge that made us uncopyable.
• Reputation is everything. Exiting responsibly mattered more than short-term profit.
• Negotiate creatively. The earn-out deal proved that you don’t need upfront cash to get value.

Entrepreneurship isn’t about smooth growth curves. It’s chaos management.
You start messy, grow scrappy, and when the engines cut out, you learn how to land the plane.

And if you do it right, the ripples touch far more than yourself; they touch your clients, your team, and even your family.