I’ve always loved to travel. An unfulfilled dream of mine is to leave all of my worldly possessions behind and travel around the world for months or years at a time. That plan is also my back-up strategy for if the United States takes a real dive in quality of life. We’re planning to retire elsewhere, but since the election, we’ve given some serious thought to leaving sooner — with the kids. I’m a planner, so I created a spreadsheet and started doing research into all kinds of countries, their lifestyles, and VISA requirements. Here’s a tiny portion of what I’ve learned so far about moving abroad. Maybe it’ll help you if you’re in the same boat?
What We’re Looking For
We have a number of things we’d like in a new homeland. If we’re going to go through the trouble of relocating, then some aspects should be upgrades, right? Here’s our wish list for moving abroad.
Must-Haves:
- Safety: Safety is a subjective measure, but freedrom from political unrest and violence is a baseline requirement.
- Feasibility: This place must have VISA requirements that we could achieve.
- Pet Entry: I realized pretty quickly that I couldn’t leave our cats. They’re the absolute best!
- Cost of Living: It needs to be reasonable. I don’t want to go back to full-time work any time soon if I can help it.
- Happiness: A high happiness index is important. This seems like a subjective assessment of a country, but I do think some countries provide services and have a cultural mindset that aids overall happiness. The happiness index is a good indication of whether a country fits that bill.
Would Like to Haves:
- Proximity: Close enough to fly back home quickly, but not so close that we’d be putting ourselves at risk if the U.S. started a war.
- Weather: We live in Wisconsin right now and it would sure be nice to have warmer weather year-round. Luckily, most places fall into this category.
- Semi-Retirement: The ability to get a VISA without working would be nice. Both of us are semi-retired and would like to stay that way if we can.
- Healthcare: Most places have better and cheaper healthcare than the United States.
- English: I don’t feel strongly about this one. A second language is one of the most important gifts you can give someone. So, I might be secretly rooting for a non-English-speaking country. But, my husband doesn’t speak another language, and most of our kids are just starting languages, so I feel that English-speakers may ease the transition a bit.
- School Options: We’d rather not homeschool our kids. One of them has ADHD and really needs the structure of going to school. The other three really need their friendships (don’t we all). So, we’re looking for somewhere where the public schools are good, or there are international schools taught in English that we can send our kids to.
Moving Abroad: Nowhere is Perfect
Reading this list reminds me of watching House Hunters. Everyone comes in with an impossible list of “wants” and ends up needing to compromise. There are some countries on my list who are nearly perfect (Oh, Canada), but I’d have to go back to work to get a work VISA or it’s colder than I’d like. Or they’re so far away that the jump seems a bit scarier (for example, New Zealand is my favorite country in the world, and maybe the only one I would happily go back to work to move to). Some have really helpful VISA requirements, but we’ve never been there, so there’s the element of the unknown.
One thing I realized very quickly is that nowhere checks all of the boxes for us. We’re going to have to compromise while moving abroad.
Countries We’re Intrigued By
That being said, there are some places on my short list right now:
New Zealand
We’re visiting again this Christmas. I’ve never, ever been to a country before where I felt like I fit in immediately. The people are wonderful. The country is beautiful. The infrastructure is great. They care about the environment and human rights. And they’ve got prawn chips and pavlova. Enough said. I’d find a job and move here in a second if they’ll have me. Since it’s such a fantastic country and half the world would probably love to live there, they have pretty strict immigration paths. We could work or study. We could also open a business that would employ Kiwis (New Zealanders). If our kids ended up becoming residents, they could help us become residents.
It is also halfway around the world. This is both a feature and a bug in my eyes. It would be hard to visit family and friends in the U.S. often (but maybe they’d like to come visit us?!). But it’s also so out-of-the-way that when missiles start flying, we might escape the worst of it. Maybe. Also, after the U.S. election, VISA applications to New Zealand went up 2000%. I feel bad for the employees who have to deal with that. I doubt that many people will actually move when it comes down to it.
Portugal
Portugal has always been on my radar as a haven for early-retiree expats. I know a couple of people already there and loving it. The weather is much nicer, their quality of life is great, the food is wonderful, and the path to EU Citizenship is fairly straightforward. They are, however, getting sick of the influx of expats. I don’t blame them. For us, we’d likely be looking at a digital nomad VISA or a D7 retirement VISA. We’re headed to Portugal next summer to check it out. I would love to have an excuse to learn a new language and until I do, I recall that getting by with my Spanish was fairly easy last time I was there.
Spain
Speaking of Spanish, Spain has a decent immigration path as well. It’s also a beautiful country with lots of history, like Portugal, except that unlike Portugal, there is another type of VISA we could take advantage of if we act fast. Spain has a Golden VISA that would allow you to jump onto the residency path if you buy 500,000 euros worth of property. Unfortunately that is likely going away in January, so you’d have to act really fast. One of my friends who is also shopping around for a new homeland found out that Spain has a rather high wealth tax, which may make it tougher for retirees to decide they want to live there. I’ve lived in Spain before when I studied in Sevilla in 2003 and had a lovely time. I know I could be happy there and I also speak Spanish, so those are win-wins.
Costa Rica
I’ve always heard that Costa Rica was a great place to retire. The main reason? It has great healthcare. Well, it also has warm weather and reasonable VISA requirements. They have a pensioner’s VISA and after 2-3 years of living there, you can apply for citizenship. I haven’t been to Costa Rica yet, but now it’s high on my visit list. It’s also nice that English is fairly widely-spoken and that I’d get to use my Spanish too. From a language perspective, this seems like almost an ideal situation.
Mexico
Mexico, our neighbor to the South, has a pretty good VISA situation too and its close proximity is very helpful. I immediately thought about Canada first (I love Canada and everyone I’ve ever met from there), but, it’s New Zealand-level hard to get there. I’d definitely have to go back to work or school. When I realized that Mexico had a Temporary Resident VISA, I got kind of excited. It’s warmer, there’s diving, I’ve been there several times, and I speak the language.
But, it’s not my favorite country. I’ve never felt “at home” there like I do in Canada and New Zealand. You can’t drink the water and there are some areas that are legit dangerous (though most of them aren’t). That being said, Mexico has a lot to offer an ex-pat. As part of my search, I ended up signing up for emails from Expatsi, a company started by a couple who helps people move abroad. They ended up moving to Mexico and are very happy with their choice. Expatsi runs expat trips where you can visit different neighbors and meet others who are looking to move or who already live there. If we decide to move to Mexico, we will definitely go on one of their trips first.
Four-Year Cruise
There’s one more option that is intriguing, though I’m treating like more of a joke. Vila Vie Residences is offering a four-year cruise so you can “skip Trump’s second term”. You would hang out on the boat for years, visiting 140 countries, but not the United States for the next four years.
They’re calling it their “Escape for Reality” cruise and I think that marketing is kind of brilliant. Prices start at $40k for one person for one year and go up to $360k for two people for four years. The problem, of course, is that the decisions made in the next four years will impact us for far longer than that. You’d still be returning home to a mess (I hope I’m wrong about that, but right now I think that’s realistic). But, if you’re not sure where to go and just want to check-out the rest of the world, this cruise could be an option.
There’s No Place Like Home
I’m not saying we’ll actually move. Our living situation in Madison, Wisconsin is quite good. We have great schools, great people, and a great location. It’s an awful lot of work to move and I for one would only like to do it if my life overall will be much better. But, it’s always important to have an exit strategy in case things go South. I hope they don’t, but I’m not holding my breath.