I am relaxing on our front porch at our home in Uruguay, about two miles from downtown Punta del Este. Another cloudless November morning, the crystal-clear sunshine and gentle sea breeze promise another comfortable spring day. Punta del Este has been a perennially solid place to invest, with a high-performing rental market.
I walked into Susana’s home on a Saturday night… a magnificent contemporary that overlooks the city of Cuenca, Ecuador, from a hillside high above. About half of her guests had already arrived and were seated around a conversation pit that faced a stunning glass wall through which we could see an ocean of sparkling city lights below...
Over the past 10 years, I thought I’d picked some of the world’s best places to live…places that stood out because of their fantastic lifestyle, rich culture, and low cost of living. Walking the cobblestones of Spanish colonial cities… enjoying the convenient city living in a world capital… and beachfront living on a tropical island seemed pretty hard to beat.
When traveling abroad with an eye toward retiring or buying a second home, you’re going to need a local phone number. This allows you to make inexpensive local calls while you’re overseas. And, just as importantly, it allows local people to call you.
The young lady came out of the bar with three mugs of dark beer. She put one in front of IL Real Estate Editor Ronan McMahon, one was for Eoin Bassett—managing editor of this magazine—and one was mine. Ronan ordered a sizzling burger… which the owner assured us was the city’s best. We were discussing our day spent exploring Medellín, Colombia, and how we were going to write about our various discoveries. Within a half-hour, a few expats joined us -- Rich, Sarah, Scott, and Dennis. Each has a fascinating story.
Medellín combines three important benefits that most of us look for when searching for an overseas destination; year-round excellent weather, an enviable lifestyle, and affordable properties. And in 10 years of searching the world for the perfect getaway, I’ve never seen anything quite like it.
The morning sunshine is streaming through the open window as I grind rich Colombian coffee bought yesterday at the local shop. Every new day here starts with inspiring views as sunlight spills over the hillside towns on the far side of the valley.
When you first move abroad almost everything you see is a wonderful surprise. And if you’re lucky, as I was in Ecuador, the wonder can last for years.
International Living’s Retirement Index always brings back fond memories of my own analysis that preceded my first move abroad. My means of choosing a country back then was simple. I only studied the categories on the Index that were important to me and threw out the countries that didn’t score well in those areas. Cost of living was high on my list…as were climate and real estate. I didn’t particularly care about the ratings for political stability, or the ability to get half-price movie tickets.
I came away from my first visit to Nicaragua, in 2004, with a lopsided image of the coastal lifestyle in Central America’s largest country. There’s another, far more “authentic” and affordable environment to explore along this country’s central and northern Pacific coast.