"Quality of life" involves dozens of items. Some are huge -- where you live and work, and who you live with. Some are small -- a favorite coffee mug. I love to read. For me, it's a quality of life issue. If I couldn't read, my life would be far less enjoyable and meaningful. So when we first started talking about living in another country, I knew I had to find a way to feed my reading habit no matter where in the world I found myself. At that time we had thousands of books in our house. …
How to Choose the Perfect Country for Your Expat Retirement — without Spending a Fortune
Nobody can completely take away the challenges of an overseas move. No matter how carefully you plan and prepare, life will invariably throw you some curves and you'll have to cope with the unexpected, unanticipated, or just plain frustrations that are part of the process. You can lessen that pain by having lots of good information. It's completely possible to find out everything you need to online, at no charge (except your time and energy). The only problem is, it'll take a lot of …
Choosing a Niche for Your Portable Career
Which way will lead to a more profitable portable career? Offering to do "everything" in your industry, or offering a service or product that's very specific? If you're a writer, will you write everything for everyone? Well, maybe you could, but how would you market your services? How do you stand out from the crowd? You'll go farther, faster, if you carve out a narrow niche for yourself. When you do that you can develop a reputation for excellence and expertise, and you'll become the go-to …
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Expats, Life and Love for Valentine’s Day
Today is Valentine's Day, so I thought we'd start today's post with a little love story. Back in the 1600's, a young man fell in love with a beautiful young woman he saw in the bazaar. Not an uncommon event, I'm sure. They married a few years later, and lived happily together until she died while giving birth to their 14th (!) child. The husband was devastated, and decided to remember his dear wife with a stunning monument. Four hundred years later, that monument is considered one of the …
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Create a Social Media Profile for your Portable Career
After the recent post on 5 Social Media Platforms Every Expat Blogger Should Use, one reader commented that he "never really caught on to the social networking thing." Well, if you're not creating a portable career, you don't have to "get" social networking. However, if you'll need to support yourself overseas as a writer, blogger, photographer, life coach or in some other portable career, you have a choice: learn to use social media to attract an audience and clients, or spend a lot of money …
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Expats, Prepare and Beware the Tax Man
Dear Future Expats, This is not the column I had planned for today. However, when I got this letter in my mailbox yesterday, I knew I had to share it with you ASAP. It's from Leif Simon of Live & Invest Overseas. I'll have a few further comments at the end. . . "The IRS is grabbing headlines again this week. Unfortunately, this time, it's at the serious expense of a friend of mine, U.S. tax attorney Chris Rusch. "Kathleen and I spent last week with Chris in Medellin. He was a presenter at …
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