For a change of pace today, I thought I’d share with you some YouTube videos about expats and their new homes. A quick YouTube search of “expat” turns up over 4,000 videos. As you’d expect, some are good, some are terrible and most are in between. Some are slick, commercially produced efforts, most are not. The ones I find most interesting are individuals who shares specifics about their new homes.

I’ve chosen 14 videos worth a look. We’ll come back to this from time to time, so please don’t think I’m ignoring large chunks of the world.

Latin America

1. Retire Early in Mexico

2. Live, work and retire in Mexico. This video looks specifically at Merida, on the Yucatan Peninsula.
3. Living in Mexico, Moving to Mexico and Retiring in Mexico. An American couple moves to San Miguel de Allende.
4. A Retirement in Panama: Everything Under the Sun. This is a professionally created video by International Living.
5. Ecuador – One Man’s Dream
6. To Live in Cuenca, Ecuador
7. Cuenca Day and Night
8. Costa Rica Expat interviews w/Wayne

Asia

1. The Expat Life: Dumpling 101 An adventure in Chinese cooking. This is a really cute video of a US expat in China trying to make Chinese dumplings, to his daughter’s disapproval.

2. Life in Korea. The first month’s of a young American teacher’s adventures in Korea.
3. Life as an Expat in Thailand: Getting a Job
4. How to Live and Work as a Teacher in Thailand
5. Why Malaysia? A British expat explains his reasons.
6. Expat Women in Hong Kong Society. This video gives a glimpse of the down side of expatriation — what do you know when the society you’re living in doesn’t want to mingle with you?

Can you recommend other online videos worth watching about expats and expat destinations? Add your comment to share!

If you plan to start a business overseas — and most of you indicated you’ll have to generate some income to finance your overseas lifestyle — Panama is the country to look at. According to Kathleen Peddicord, publisher of the Overseas Retirement Letter, the country’s friendliness to business is why she and her real estate developer husband moved from Paris to Panama two years ago.

Kathleen explains:

“In the past few months, since my How to Retire Overseas book was published, I’ve been interviewed by at least two dozen members of the media…and every one of them has wondered:

” ‘You moved from Paris to Panama two years ago? Why would you do that?’

“Here’s the truth. If we had no children, no business, and no agenda beyond pursuing the best possible quality of life, we’d have stayed put in Paris. For us, the City of Light (from which I write you today…we’re here for the month of July) is the best place in the world to call home.

“However, about 2 ½ years ago, I did have another agenda. Having sold out my participation in the International Living group, where I’d been publisher for more than 23 years, I decided I wasn’t ready for retirement. What I wanted to do, I realized, was to start over…to build a new business from the ground up.

“France, I knew from experience, was not the place for this. The French are not the nasty, rude people many Americans imagine them to be, but one French stereotype is real: They have little tolerance for the entrepreneurial imagination. The red tape, the bureaucracy, the taxes, and the labor law in this country make it one of the least appealing places on earth to start or operate a business.

“Lief and I knew we’d have to relocate if I wanted to make a real go of a new business venture. But where?

“We took stock of our previous entrepreneurial adventures. By that time, we’d run businesses in the United States, Ireland, France, Nicaragua, Honduras, Ecuador, Nicaragua, Mexico, and Panama.

“When deciding where to base a business, you want to consider five things: the labor pool (how educated and at what cost); the infrastructure; relevant tax rates; the doing-business climate; and local labor law. Considering the world map and taking into account our own experiences, we concluded that, all things considered, Panama is the top choice worldwide if you’re in the market for a place to launch the kind of business I was in the market to launch.

“No place in the world is as entrepreneur-friendly as the United States when it comes to labor law. Nowhere else, for example, can you fire at will (without incurring costly consequences). The rest of the world favors the employee over the employer. We used to joke in France and Ireland that employees were for life. You hired a new one understanding that you were taking a big risk and incurring a long-term liability.

“This is much less true in Panama, but, still, sometimes, we miss the good old days in the States when we could ask an employee to leave on the spot — without written notices, without witnessed warnings, without the calling of tribunals — if his performance warranted it.

“That aside, Panama checks every box you want checked when you set out to start a business. We’ve been delighted by the eclectic pool of labor we’ve been able to tap into in Panama City. In our downtown office today, we have a Romanian, a German, two Russians, three Americans, and four Panamanians. All are educated and hard-working.

“In our high-rise office, we have high-speed wireless Internet, a VOIP phone system, and a telephone number that’s toll-free when dialed from the United States. As we’ve grown, we’ve been able to source bigger and more sophisticated IT and web-support systems, including an American IT pro in the city who responds immediately to our calls for help.

“Panama business taxes? We aren’t liable for any. Structure your business in this country properly, and you won’t be either. Depending where and how your revenues are sourced and, again, how your company is set up, you can operate corporate tax-free.

“The doing-business climate? Panama’s current President Ricardo Martinelli, a successful businessman himself, couldn’t be more pro-entrepreneur. Martinelli has made it his administration’s mission to make Panama the most business-friendly jurisdiction in the hemisphere, and he’s making good progress.

“At a recent American Chamber of Commerce meeting I attended, the Vice Minister of Commerce reported to the assembled group on his ministry’s efforts to attract mega multi-national companies to Panama. They’ve signed on more than 40 big-time international operations to date. Their goal is 100 by year-end.

“What’s getting the attention of the presidents and CEOs of some of the world’s biggest companies?

“They’re looking at the same things I looked at 2 ½ years ago–the labor pool, the tax situation, the infrastructure, and the doing-business climate.

“For them the stakes are much bigger. For my part, I can tell you that our little operation is thriving.”

Photo by Catherine Perkins

Guest Post by Barbara Diggs

Lucky is the expat that has no lingering guilt associated with his or her decision to live abroad. But, I think, rare is that expat also.

Maybe you feel a bit guilty about how living abroad will affect your children, or you worry about the feelings of loved ones left behind. You might even have conflicted feelings about preferring another country over your own.

For me, as excited as I was to move to Paris nine years ago, I felt terribly guilty about leaving my mother behind.

At the time of my decision to move, my father had died only sixteen months earlier and my mother was still adjusting to her new life. Even though my brother and sister lived in the same city as she – and I didn’t – I fretted that I was bailing out at a time that she needed me.



Moreover, I knew that even without the complicating factor of my father’s death, she wouldn’t really understand or appreciate my desire to live in another country. This was a woman who lived (and still lives) five minutes away from where she was born, grew up, married, divorced and married again. Although she’d visited many U.S. states, she had never left the country and nor expressed any desire to, save a vague wish to visit the Caribbean.

I knew she would see my wish to live in Paris as evidence of my so-called “wildness” (she thought me “wild” because I did things like go skiing, parasailing, and make trips down the coast of California alone), and because she’d consider the move to be “wild” and strange, it would worry her.

There was no particular point at which I broke the news to her. I had decided to move to Paris after visiting a friend there on the back end of one of my “wild” ski trips in the French Alps. I was leaning out the windows of my friend’s apartment on rue du Bac, watching ordinary scenes of Parisian life below, when I became gripped with the notion that I had to live in Paris. I didn’t want to be another fly-by-night tourist exclaiming, “I feel like I’m in a movie!” when wandering down Parisian streets. I wanted to have a real relationship with the city.

Still looking out the window, I called my boyfriend (now husband) in New York and said,“Let’s move to Paris,” and he said, “Let’s do it.”

When I returned to the U.S., I was bursting with the news, like a girl in love. My mother heard the news of our decision along with the rest of my family and friends, but other than getting a queer deer-in-the-headlights look on her face when I talked about it, she didn’t say much. She probably didn’t take me seriously since there were few people less equipped to move to Paris than me: I couldn’t speak a word of French, nor was I qualified to practice law in France, and I was too saddled with student loans wait tables or teach English.

It was only when I got a lead on a law job in Paris it dawned on her that I was determined to make the move happen. When I told her about the potential job, a pained expression crossed her face and she wailed: “Can’t you wait until I’m dead?” I shot back: “I have to wait that long? You’re only sixty-five!” But even as I hugged her and told her not to be silly and to think of all the great trips she would take, guilt grabbed my heart and twisted it with both hands.

Fifteen months after I made that fateful call to my boyfriend, he and I moved to Paris. (How we both managed to get jobs is another story.)

A full year later, my mother made her first trip across the Atlantic Ocean. I cannot describe the pleasure it gave me to see my homebody mother sitting in Parisian café (fanning her hands against the smoke, it’s true), savoring a chausson aux pommes, or gasping with delight upon seeing the Eiffel Tower or Sacre Coeur.

As she visited more and more over the years, I marveled that this woman who had only been on an airplane two or three times before I moved, had grown so comfortable with international travel that once when her plane was diverted to Lyon because of fog in Paris, she hardly turned a hair (while I was freaking out with worry). When she safely arrived in Paris she mused that next time she would like to actually see Lyon.

My husband and I have been living in Paris for over nine years now, and my mother comes over two or three times a year. She walks down Parisian streets and handles basic transactions with an ease that makes me swell with pride.

While I still have rushes of guilt about living abroad, a year or two ago, she said something that assured me that I made the right decision. She was at lunch with a friend and other people she didn’t know very well, when the conversation turned to Paris and London. “It made me feel so good that I’d actually visited these places and was able to join the conversation,” she told me later. “I probably knew Paris better than anyone there!”

I realized then that my expat journey has been a journey for her as well — an enlightening, confidence-building journey in which she has discovered the fun of being “wild,” and the pleasure of having an intimate relationship with a city that most people only dream of.

Isn’t it lucky, then, that I didn’t “wait until she was dead” to move to Paris? Sure, she misses me … but if I hadn’t moved, there are other things she would have missed as well.

Barbara Diggs is a lawyer-turned-freelance writer living in Paris. She blogs about her expat life at International Mama.

How has your family influenced your choices? Click the Comment link below.

Recently, the Live and Invest Overseas e-letter has been talking about France in the run-up to their upcoming conference about living and investing there. France is not one of the countries we’ve been considering as a retirement destination because of the expense. But with headlines like, “Your Second Home In France (Could Cost As Little As 45,000 Euro),” is it worth reconsidering, I wonder?

Correspondent Lucy Culpepper writes with enthusiasm about the Languedoc and Bearn regions of the country and touts a one-bedroom apartment for 28,000 Euro, a stone townhouse needing renovation for $42,700, a two-bedroom village house furnished for $70,419. . . she makes it sound very enticing.

Kathleen Peddicord writes glowingly about the joys of Parisian life, which she and her family enjoyed for several years before moving to Panama.

“We lived in Paris for four years, with two children, and I’m here to tell you that we were able to control our costs within a very reasonable budget.”

Unfortunately, she doesn’t define that “very reasonable budget.” According to an email, it’s possible to “live in France on US $1,300 a month.”

Would that it were true! Year after year, France is voted the country with the best quality of life and best health care. Our daughter has just returned from a 2-1/2 month trip to France and she definitely fell in love with Paris. Our son speaks French fluently, has fond memories of a visit and speaks of going there to live. The thought of living in France is tremendously appealing on many levels.

I just have a hard time believing that it’s affordable on a Social Security income.

I’d love to hear from any expats in France who can provide some real-world experience!

Last month I listed 9 Expat Blogs that I personally follow. Got such a great response I thought I’d add a few more. This list is focused on Central and South America, and I’ll add more recommendations later for other regions.

Personal Blogs

1. Expat Alley. Tom Frost shares his expat knowledge and interviews other expats. Originally from Oregon, USA, Tom has lived in Japan, Mexico, Argentina and is currently establishing a farm in Uruguay.

2. Flavors of Ecuador author Carrie explores Ecuadorian culture and history through one of my favorite media, food. Yummy pictures throughout! (Warning — when I’ve visited, the site has loaded rather slowly, but it’s worth the wait.)
3. From LA to BA. Argentine native grew up in Los Angeles, then moved back to Buenos Aires.
4. Balanced Melting Pot. Haitian national grew up in the US, then went back to Haiti and now lives and raises her family in Caracas, Venezuela.
5. Living in Patagonia. US couple from Lake Tahoe moved to Patagonia, Argentina.
6. 2 Gringos in the Caribbean. Couple moved, with their child and dog, from the northeast US to Turks & Caicos Islands.

   Professional Blogs

7. Yucatan Living. Online magazine for expats in the Yucatan, and for those considering the Yucatan as a destination for retiring, starting a business or owning a second home.

8. Nomadas Globales Argentina. Intercultural training and coaching from Natalia Sarro.
9. Expat Daily News, with editions for Central America and South America.
10. Traveling4Health. Excellent resources for both medical tourists and expats.

Do you have a favorite expat blog (or blogs) that you would like to recommend? Just click the comment button below. We love new blog recommendations!

It’s been a while since I’ve done any kind of list, so I thought I’d give you a look today at some of the expat blogs I follow, and that you might find helpful, too.

1. Empty Nest Expat. Currently living in Prague, the blogger describes herself as “an American expatriate bursting with enthusiasm to GET OUT AND EXPERIENCE OUR GLOBE! ”

2. Living In the Sun. This is a website with four offshoot blogs, each dealing with a European/Mediterranean country. There’s one for France, Portugal, Spain and Greece.
3. Soul Travelers 3. Two fifty-something parents and a nine-year old travel the world in “an epic odyssey: open-ended, years long slow trip around the world as a family adventure, unschool, spiritual journey and lifestyle.”
4. Expat+Harem. A Berkely, CA native living in Istanbul with her Turkish husband.
5. My Several Worlds. The author is a traveler and photographer. Originally from Ottawa, Canada, she currently lives and works in Taipei. Her site features gorgeous photos, as well as information about teaching English abroad.
6. Career by Choice. Megan Fitzgerald helps expats develop their careers abroad.
7. Traveling4Health. While not specifically an expat blog, this is a terrific resource for anyone interested in health care abroad.
8. Mid-Atlantic English, the blog of an American who’s lived for an extended time in the UK.
9. The Cranky Yank. This is the personal blog of Dan Prescher from International Living, and he always has a unique perspective.

   Do you have a favorite expat blog? Share it by clicking on the Comment link below.

   ]]> http://futureexpats.com/9-expat-blogs-to-follow/feed 7 http://futureexpats.com/yucatan-mexico-prepared-to-give-us-retirees-what-they-want http://futureexpats.com/yucatan-mexico-prepared-to-give-us-retirees-what-they-want#comments Fri, 09 Apr 2010 20:42:27 +0000 FutureExpat http://futureexpats.com/?p=1837 Writing for International Living today, Dan Prescher described a meeting he recently attended with “government officials, local entrepreneurs and international consultants” in Merida, Mexico a few days ago. I thought this was interesting enough that I postponed the post I was planning for today to bring you Dan’s report:

   El Castillo, Chichen Itza,

   Continue reading Yucatan, Mexico Prepared to Give US Retirees What They Want

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   Writing for International Living today, Dan Prescher described a meeting he recently attended with “government officials, local entrepreneurs and international consultants” in Merida, Mexico a few days ago. I thought this was interesting enough that I postponed the post I was planning for today to bring you Dan’s report:

   

   El Castillo, Chichen Itza, Maya Ruins, Yucatan Peninsula, Mexico

   
   
   

   “Mexico’s Yucatan state is a tropical paradise and a paradise for history and archeology buffs… but a retirement paradise for U.S. Baby Boomers?

   “Developing Yucatan into a Mecca for Americans 50 year of age and older was the action plan being discussed at a meeting of government officials, local entrepreneurs, and international consultants held in Merida, Yucatan, on Wednesday April 7 titled ‘Adults Over 50 – The Housing, Attention and Service Industry.’

   “Coordinated by the Governor’s Office of Finance and Development, the meeting brought together movers and shakers from around the state and the globe to determine how best to make Merida and Yucatan State a top destination for a future flood of U.S. retirees looking for a quality life at a lower cost.

   “According to speaker David Collins, consultant and managing partner of Active Living International, there will be 100 million Americans 50 years of age or older by 2012.

   “Collins said that meeting the needs of this huge group will be a major economic driver for the housing and health care industries for years to come.

   “He said Yucatan state is uniquely positioned to meet those needs at a fraction of the cost for similar services in the U.S.

   “ ‘Merida (Yucatan’s capital) is safe, welcoming, has good transportation and energy infrastructure, a great climate, and is close to the U.S.’ said Collins.

   “ ‘Real estate and labor prices here are very inexpensive compared to the U.S. If the right combination of residential properties and health care facilities are available, then all the elements are here to draw retirees who are looking for alternatives to higher-priced U.S. retirement options.’

   “Collins warned, however, that few countries seeking to draw U.S. retirees to their shores understand the radical shifts that the 50+ housing and health markets have gone through in America.

   “ ‘If you’re still building rows of half-million-dollar beach and golf course homes for wealthy American retirees, you don’t understand what’s happened,’ said Collins.

   “ ‘In the wake of the global economic crisis and the health care debate in the U.S., Americans are no longer focused on status, exclusivity, luxury, amenities, and golf,’ said Collins.

   ” ‘Their focus now is on smaller residential properties with long-term value in places that have a sense of community and an active social life. They are focused on what I call ‘QTR’… Quality Time Remaining.’

   “ ‘They want lower-cost properties in desirable locations that they can use now for vacation homes and rental income. They want them to be good quality and low maintenance, preferably with on-site rental management. And they want to be able to retire comfortably in these properties when the time comes, knowing that they are near top-quality assisted living and long-term health care facilities.’

   ” ‘The nature of those assisted living and long-term facilities is crucial,’ said Marco Álvarez, director of Dabvsa, a Mexican company that builds and operates adult care facilities.

   “ ‘We’re talking about something called continuing care retirement communities,’ said Álvarez. ‘These are places that offer a spectrum of care, from independent living to assisted living to around-the-clock nursing care. They make the transition between these care levels as easy and natural as possible for consumers and their families.’

   “ ‘Americans assume the presence of these facilities in the U.S., but not in Mexico. Having facilities like this in Merida, with the accompanying cost savings in labor over the U.S., could complete the picture of the Yucatan as a high-quality, low-cost retirement destination for that huge number of future U.S. retirees.’

   “The meeting was held in cooperation with Universidad del Mayab and Instituto Cumbres in Merida and COPARMEX Merida, an association of businessmen, real estate professionals, and developers. All present agreed that it would take the combined effort and cooperation of state government, economic education and research facilities, and the local business community to successfully develop and implement a strategy to make Yucatan a real ‘paradise for the retiree.’

   “ ‘Here in Yucatan and Merida we have everything going for us right now,’ said Sergio Raimond, professor of Economics at the Pan-American Institute of Business Policy (IPAD). ‘This is our opportunity to take advantage of or ours to lose.’

   “Merida is already home to several hundred U.S. expats, many of whom moved for better weather, lower cost of living, and more affordable health care. “

   ____________________
   Interested in Moving to Mexico?
   Find all the Information You Need
   Mexico: The Owner’s Manual
   
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   ]]> http://futureexpats.com/yucatan-mexico-prepared-to-give-us-retirees-what-they-want/feed 0 http://futureexpats.com/its-not-the-easter-bunny-its-the-easter-bell http://futureexpats.com/its-not-the-easter-bunny-its-the-easter-bell#comments Tue, 06 Apr 2010 02:12:57 +0000 FutureExpat http://futureexpats.com/?p=1808

   Gifts from the Easter Bell

   My youngest daughter is halfway through a 2-1/2 month sojourn in France. This Easter, she was fortunate to spend the weekend with a French family in the village of Soissons.

   The village is northeast of Paris, about halfway to the Belgian border. The Cathedral Saint-Gervais & Saint-Protais dates from

   Continue reading It’s Not the Easter Bunny, It’s the Easter Bell!

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   Gifts from the Easter Bell

   My youngest daughter is halfway through a 2-1/2 month sojourn in France. This Easter, she was fortunate to spend the weekend with a French family in the village of Soissons.

   The village is northeast of Paris, about halfway to the Belgian border. The Cathedral Saint-Gervais & Saint-Protais dates from the 12th century, and a municipal museum is housed in the former Saint Léger Abbey, also started during the 12th century. They approached the village down avenues lined with Prunius trees in full blossom.
   
   My daughter’s weekend family included

   • maman

   • papa
   • two grandmeres
   • two single grown children
   • one son with his
     • wife

     • daughter
     • infant son

   At one point, there were 10 people around the table. Most of the conversation was in French, German and English but Dutch, Russian, Spanish, Japanese and the old language of Brittany were also represented.

   Chocolate and Candy

   The French hide chocolate and candy for the kids, but the perpetrater isn’t the Easter Bunny. It’s the cloche (bell). This apparently came about because all the church bells are silent from Good Friday until Easter morning, so when the bells return, the candy appears. It’s hidden outside, not indoors.

   The Easter Bell did hide chocolate outside on the terrace for the little girl to find. But my daughter and each of the other young adults received a gift of candy and chocolate as well — they just didn’t have to hunt for it!

   Good food played an important role in the weekend’s festivities (naturellement — it’s France!). Meals included a duck confit, lamb, and a wonderful orange dessert.
   

   

   You can't see it, but there's a layer of cake at the bottom.

   
   My daughter also tried escargot for the first time. She’s not a big fan, but the garlic sauce it was served with was delicious!

   Other notable foods included a homemade vegetable soup, quiche, apple tart, brioche, French cheeses, and bread.

   Have you experienced a holiday in another country that you’d like to share? Click the Comment link below.

   ]]> http://futureexpats.com/its-not-the-easter-bunny-its-the-easter-bell/feed 0 http://futureexpats.com/cost-of-renting-in-panama http://futureexpats.com/cost-of-renting-in-panama#comments Mon, 29 Mar 2010 21:00:43 +0000 FutureExpat http://futureexpats.com/?p=1761

   Panama is one of the countries my husband and I are considering, so I was very interested to see a recent post in Live and Invest Overseas detailing costs of renting in three Panama locations.

   Panama City, specifically the El Cangrejo neighborhood. It’s necessary to be neighborhood-specific because, as in any other big city,

   Continue reading Cost of Renting in Panama

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   Panama is one of the countries my husband and I are considering, so I was very interested to see a recent post in Live and Invest Overseas detailing costs of renting in three Panama locations.

   
   1. Panama City, specifically the El Cangrejo neighborhood. It’s necessary to be neighborhood-specific because, as in any other big city, there are areas that are more or less desireable with pricing to match. The neighborhood is described as “cool, hip, safe, welcoming and increasingly affordable.”

      “Prices in ever-more-popular El Cangrejo peaked last year and are slowly coming back down to earth. New condominium construction boomed in 2006, and the thousands of units developed at that time are now coming online. This has made both rentals and sales markets more competitive citywide, including in El Cangrejo.

      “Rental rates for a new, furnished apartment in El Cangrejo are in the range of US$8 to US$15 per square meter. Older apartment rental units go for less than US$8 a square meter, sometimes, if you’re in the right place at the right time, for as little as US$3 a square meter.

      “A friend just this week rented a 200-square-meter*, two-bedroom, two-bathroom apartment, just off Via Argentina, El Cangrejo’s main thoroughfare, for US$600. The place has air conditioning in both bedrooms and hot water, two luxuries not guaranteed in Panamanian rentals at this price point. Another 200-square-meter apartment in El Cangrejo, this one with three bedrooms and two bathrooms, is available at press time for US$900 a month.

      “If you prefer newer and fancier, a one-bedroom loft in this neighborhood, furnished, with a gym and a pool in the common area, is currently on offer for US$1,650 per month.”

   2. Boquete, where lots of expats live.
      

      “Rental rates are higher in Boquete than many other places in the country. Expect to pay US$500 to US$1,000 to rent a comfortable house. … To get a good deal, you need a local connection. Rentals you find advertised on websites are the priciest. To find something more reasonable, you’ll need to visit Boquete in person, asking everyone you meet if he knows of any rentals currently available. Someone you ask will know someone who knows someone who has a cousin or an uncle who is looking to rent his home.”

   3. Las Tablas, the Live and Invest Overseas pick for low-cost beach living in Panama.
      

      ” ‘You’ve got to be kidding me,’ is the usual reaction resident Panama Editor Rebecca Tyre gets when she tells people how much she pays for her three-bedroom, two-bathroom, three-year-old rental house in this town.

      ” ‘Living in Las Tablas,’ Rebecca explains, ‘I paid less in rent than I spent on groceries each month. My house, which is just five kilometers from Playa Las Comadres and a five-minute walk from downtown, costs just US$200 a month. Friends have similar rental houses and pay between US$250 and US$500 per month.’

      “Rebecca’s friend Merrill rents a simple beachfront loft for US$300 a month, for example. Another friend, Rick, recently returned to Canada for six months. He rented his fully furnished, two-bedroom house for US$500…and threw in use of his car.

      “You won’t find deals like these on websites or working with a real estate agent. Generally, they come your way once you’ve established local relationships. Rick rented his house to a fellow Canadian he knew from around town. Rebecca found her house thanks to a connection through her Panamanian boyfriend.”

   You can read the entire article here.

   So there you have it. Three different locations within the country, three very different costs. My personal favorite at this point? Las Tablas. That is, if I can get a reliable internet connection there, which all my sources tell me I can.

   
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   The Versatile Freelancer
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   *Outside the US, most places measure in meters rather than feet. 200 square meters is about 2153 square feet. So if you see someplace advertised at 100 square meters, think a bit over 1000 square feet, and so on.

   ]]> http://futureexpats.com/cost-of-renting-in-panama/feed 1 http://futureexpats.com/its-time-to-fall-in-love-with-your-life-again http://futureexpats.com/its-time-to-fall-in-love-with-your-life-again#comments Sat, 06 Mar 2010 03:21:47 +0000 FutureExpat http://futureexpats.com/?p=1621 About 500 people are gathered in Quito, Ecuador right now for International Living‘s Ultimate Event 2010. They’re learning about life in a bunch of countries where it’s possible to live well on $2,000 a month or less. Can’t be there with them? They’re offering the Ultimate Event 2010 Conference-At-Home Kit, and guaranteeing satisfaction.

   Continue reading It’s Time to Fall in Love with Your Life Again

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   About 500 people are gathered in Quito, Ecuador right now for International Living‘s Ultimate Event 2010. They’re learning about life in a bunch of countries where it’s possible to live well on $2,000 a month or less. Can’t be there with them? They’re offering the Ultimate Event 2010 Conference-At-Home Kit, and guaranteeing satisfaction. “If This Information Doesn’t Help You, Pay Nothing” they state. Substantial discounts are available if you order now.
   
   by Suzan Haskins, International Living

   Back in the U.S. another winter storm threatens the east coast, stock prices are diving thanks to high unemployment rates, the painful health care debate continues to make us all sick, and Conan O’Brien is in the news. For joining Twitter.

   Who cares…about any of it?
   
   

   Nothing works back home any more…from health care to child care, from banks to politics, from cars to bars. OK, the bars still work. But who really wants to pay $8 for a draft beer these days? Not me, and especially not when I can get a 22-ounce bottle of Pilsener, a mighty fine beer, here in Ecuador for $1. (And a full four-course meal for $2. And a three-bedroom condo for less than $50,000.)

   Wouldn’t it be nice to fall in love with your life again? To find a place with better views out your windows, better weather, a lower cost of living, and where things really work?

   According to Lee Harrison, who has lived in Ecuador, Brazil and Uruguay:

   “Everything [in Uruguay] runs like clockwork. All the roads are safe and well-kept, the parks are clean, the hardware stores and grocery stores are well-stocked, trains and buses run on time….”

   And the cost of living is low. In Montevideo, Uruguay’s famous colonial city, Lee showed us photos of a two-bedroom apartment in a building offered for $65,000. “This is a nice apartment—I would happily live in it,” he said.

   Glynna Prentice acknowledges that Mexico, where she lives, isn’t the least-expensive country. But, she says, in Mexico you can get government health insurance for $300 or less a year. And that includes all your prescription medications.

   A private insurance plan, she says, is half the cost you pay at home, as are out-of-pocket expenses.

   And this isn’t publicized, but Mexico offers a great retirement program for anyone living there as a resident. Lots of discounts on things like restaurants, cultural activities and medical care.

   Glynna says Mexico may be the easiest country for a foreigner to get a resident visa in.

   But Lee Harrison says that about Uruguay, where he plans to apply for permanent citizenship. And Dan Prescher says the same about Belize and its famous Qualified Retirement Program, which allows a host of benefits including importing your household goods, vehicle and boat duty-free and tax residency…whether you actually live there or not.

   Belize may be the easiest country to relocate to—especially if you’re concerned about the difficulties of learning a foreign language.

   There’s so much more to tell you! But of course, I can’t type up everything that’s happened here in Quito. In just two days so far, we’ve already spent 13 hours in presentations and workshops. And we have two days yet to go!

   We’ve learned about the best countries for second citizenship, the best countries to obtain residency easily and at little cost, and which provide free or very low-cost health care to residents.

   That definitely helps us know where to look to find the location of our dreams. And thanks to our speakers, we now have a very good idea of how much it will cost us to live in these countries, including the costs to buy a home, apartment, or acreage.

   Would you like to learn more about all the countries and opportunities we’re discovering here at the Ultimate Event? Let me tell you how you can…

   We’re putting together a complete package of nearly everything that’s happening at this event, with audio recordings of all 76 of the presentations.

   We’re also making copies of all the speaker handouts, PowerPoint and visual presentations. And, of course, the complete dossier we give to each attendee when they showed up here at the Swissotel in Quito.

   It’s the Ultimate Event 2010 Conference-at-Home Kit—and it covers every aspect of the 2010 Ultimate Event.

   Would you be interested in attending a conference or workshop to learn more about living overseas? Have you ever attended one? Share your thoughts by clicking the comment link below.

   Don’t miss another Future Expats update! Sign up for convenient email RSS delivery here.

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