What if this actually works……
Why do you want to become an expat?
Today I was standing in my kitchen making cookies with my Kitchenaid mixer and the thought hit me “oh my gosh! I won’t have this part of my life when i become an expat!” That is a slight exaggeration, of course. It will all be decided once we decide which kind of expat we are going to be.
Let’s go back to the original question at hand. After an incredible 18 months of traveling to Iceland, United Kingdom, Hungary, Slovenia, Croatia, France, Belgium, Spain, and Gibraltar, Jason and I discovered how much we love learning about how other countries live. We spent our entire lives in the United States, even during the last 20 years in the military, as we developed a sense of what is “normal.”
Our travels have uprooted our preconceived notions and we love this idea of challenging our definition of “normal.” We also fell in love with visiting these incredible places as inexpensively as possible. That led me to the original idea of being an expat for a year or two after Jason retires at 55.
Vacations with a hint of Expat
A few weeks ago, we finally settled on our family trip for this summer. Thailand here we come! Jason started researching (Hello? This never happens this early in our vacation planning process. Trust me!) and found a lot of information on expats living in Chiang Mai. He wasn’t looking for this information, but it just kept coming up.
He started throwing around stories of Digital Nomads virtually retiring to Thailand and working part time with a very nice quality of life.
We’ve talked about retiring overseas throughout the years, but never really thought about it seriously. Now that the retirement is near, we are talking about this a lot more. It seems within I arms-reach.
Thanks to the internet and a lot of detailed high-quality blogs, we can get a sense of what our military retirement will provide in terms of day-to-day expenses. We didn’t want to be a couple living in a remote village in order to survive on pennies a day. We want to find a balance between inexpensive cost of living, immersion in a foreign culture, continuing our travels, and spending more time with each other. We would prefer to find a place where we can live on our military retirement and let our 401K and IRA continue to grow.
So why don’t we just leave now?
Jason asked that question several times. I have three reasons.
1 I want to get our son through college. He has the use of the post-9/11 Montgomery GI Bill, and all of the U.S.-based colleges he is looking at have the Yellow Ribbon program, which means that they will cover the costs above and beyond the Montgomery GI Bill (he will not need student loans.). He is also looking at universities overseas, and this VA program will cover those costs as well. But, things happen. I want his college experience to be more stress free than mine.
2-We will continue to save money each month while we prepare to be expats. We aren’t currently planning to spend the rest of our lives as expats. At some point, we’d like to retire in central Oregon, so we’ll need to have enough savings, retirement income and military benefits to cover our expenses. The longer we work, the more we will save.
3-My mom is turning 77 this year and I need to come to terms with being even farther away from her. I’m extremely close to her and even though I live close to 3000 miles away from her now, we talk and text daily. I would hate to be in a foreign country and not be able to return to the States easily if she needed me. I also want to be able to keep up with our daily communications without breaking the bank.
Long Term Retirement Plans
Our ideal place to retire and enjoy our hobbies is in Central Oregon. I quilt and Jason enjoys gardening and woodworking. Unfortunately, central Oregon is not cheap. We can’t easily retire early AND live comfortably in Bend/Sisters. This has been a stressor for us for a few years. We’ll have to work longer to save enough for the lifestyle we want in Oregon. But, we don’t want to work until our health deteriorates and we will be limited in doing the activities we want. It is a dilemma.
Is there a way to be an Expat for just a few years?
We think so! This is the “Have your cake and eat it too, scenario.”
We believe that we can accelerate our planned retirement date, enjoy an expat lifestyle for a few years, travel the world, and experience different cultures. At the same time, we can let our investments continue to grow and we can live off of our military retirement check.
We want to become expats because we are curious. We are excited. We are life-long learners. Most all all, we are ready to move to the next chapter of our lives.
Our life is wonderful. We are happily married with an awesome teenager. But, it has the potential to be EVEN better in a few short years. We are actively planning for it now. So why do YOU want to become an expat and what are YOU doing to make that happen?