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Expat Life In Medellín, Colombia vs Cuenca, Ecuador

This City Is Your Best Option For Luxury Penthouse Living On A Pensioner's Budget

Kathleen Peddicord by Kathleen Peddicord
May 17, 2020
in Colombia, Ecuador, Lifestyle
0
simon bolivar statue in medellin

Image Source: iStock/Marc Po

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I hear from many readers who are considering both Medellín, Colombia, and Cuenca, Ecuador, as the destination for their adventure overseas… and I’m frequently asked to compare the two.

These are two of your best options right now for reinventing and restarting your life overseas. While Medellín has a first-world look and feel, Cuenca is a traditional Spanish-colonial city.

That said, Cuenca and Medellín are surprisingly similar in a number of ways.

Note that, as Medellín is a large and diverse city, I’m basing my comparisons to Cuenca on its upscale, expat-favored El Poblado neighborhood.

Weather

Both Medellín and Cuenca enjoy great weather year-round. You can live in both with neither heat nor air conditioning, which saves a lot on the monthly budget.

That said, the weather in these two cities is not the same. Medellín is warmer, with daily highs averaging about 82°F (28°C), lows in the 60s, and only 1 degree of seasonal variation. In Cuenca, monthly average highs vary from 68°F to 72°F, depending on the time of year, and nightly lows are also correspondingly less. You’ll struggle ever to break a sweat in Cuenca.

Rainfall is higher in Medellín (69 inches versus 35 inches in Cuenca), but the average number of sunny days annually is higher in Medellín.

Which city has better weather? That’s a matter of your own taste.

The altitude of both cities is worth noting. Medellín sits at about 5,000 feet above sea level (1,500 meters). Most people won’t notice the altitude unless they have respiratory problems that cause low oxygen levels. Cuenca’s elevation is about 8,300 feet (2,530 meters). You’ll probably notice the difference on arrival and then adapt to it after a short time. However, if you have oxygen-deficiency issues, Cuenca is not a good choice for you.

Residency

Residency is easy to establish in both Colombia and Ecuador, with low thresholds for visa qualification in both cases. Both countries offer retiree visa options with income requirements starting at around US$800 per month and investor options with minimums starting at US$30,000.

Colombia’s visa, however, is quicker and easier to obtain, with fewer required documents. Ecuador requires a criminal background check, for example, whereas Colombia does not.

Also, Ecuador imposes restrictions on how much time you can spend out of the country during your first two years of residency, while Colombia has no restrictions. Ecuador’s visa is intended for people who actually want to live there, while Colombia’s can also work as a back-up residency.

Both countries offer a fast path to citizenship, with some options beginning after just two years of residency.

Entertainment And Culture

The cultural scene in Medellín is similar to that in Cuenca. This is surprising because Cuenca has about 600,000 people in its metro area, while Medellín has about 4 million. In both cities, you can enjoy orchestra, theater, art openings, museums, and a generally sophisticated cultural scene. That said, the overall feeling is more sophisticated and world-class in Medellín.

You’ll pay a fee for most of these kinds of offerings in Medellín, while in Cuenca they’re usually free.

Infrastructure

The infrastructure is good in both Medellín and Cuenca. Both cities offer drinkable water, reliable broadband internet, and dependable electricity, water, and phone service.

Also, both cities are walkable and have excellent and cheap public transit systems, meaning you could live in either one without owning a car.

If you decide to drive, you’ll find traffic jams equally maddening in both cities… although Ecuador’s drivers are more rude, aggressive, and reckless than their Colombian counterparts.

Real Estate

Real estate is cheap in both cities, even by South American standards and especially in the current global climate. However, generally speaking, the standards for construction and workmanship are higher in Medellín.

In addition, Medellín offers bona-fide luxury-standard property choices. And, right now, those fully appointed penthouse with expansive city views are an almost unbelievable bargain thanks to the dollar’s supercharged exchange rate versus the Colombian peso.

This brings us to the ways in which these cities differ…

Medellín’s El Poblado offers a modern, upscale ambiance. It has elegant shopping, spotless infrastructure, glistening new buildings, and more fine dining that you might expect even from a much bigger city. New, luxury brick high-rises look down from lush, wooded hillsides. Tall trees line clean, well-maintained streets. And El Poblado is only one of several such desirable areas in this city.

On the other hand, Cuenca is one of the Americas’ premier Spanish-colonial cities and a UNESCO World Heritage Site. The old Cathedral was built in 1557, the architecture is well-preserved Spanish colonial, and the streets are cobblestoned. You’ll even see evidence of the Inca occupation from the early 1500s. Yet just outside the historic center, Cuenca also offers new, modern high-rises. So you could live in a modern home, yet have the historic center within walking distance.

El Poblado has a first-world environment; you’d be hard-pressed to find a U.S. city to beat it. Cuenca, on the other hand, is part of a developing country, with some of the third-world characteristics that it suggests—like poor sidewalk and building maintenance.

Accessibility

Access to the United States is easier from Medellín than from Cuenca.

Medellín has daily nonstops to the United States, while you’ll need to connect (and possibly spend the night) in Guayaquil or Quito when traveling to and from Cuenca. This adds a day of travel and added expense to every trip.

Expat Community

The expat community is a much greater presence in Cuenca… especially on a per-capita basis. You can find expats in Medellín if you look for them—at local coffee shops and the Irish pub, for example. However, day-to-day, don’t expect to encounter many expats in your travels around town.

In Cuenca, the expat community numbers over 5,000 people and has made a cultural imprint on the city. The impact has been generally positive.

Since the infusion of North Americans to Cuenca, there’s been an explosion in the numbers of nice cafés, restaurants, and book shops… as well as other expat-owned services and businesses. Today in Cuenca, you can find most everything you’d want for comfortable living, including fellow English-speakers. In Medellín, you’ll struggle if you don’t speak any Spanish.

Whether an expat community of that size is a positive or a negative for you will be a matter of choice.

Cost Of Living

The cost of living right now is comparable between Medellín and Cuenca, but it won’t necessarily stay that way.

The U.S. dollar today buys 3,800 Colombian pesos (May 2020). That’s very strong by historic standards. If the peso-dollar exchange rate returns to 2014 levels, Medellín will become noticeably more expensive for dollar holders. Of course, there is no way to predict if or when this will happen.

By contrast, Ecuador uses the U.S. dollar, so dollar holders don’t have to worry about a weakening dollar. Neither do they benefit from the windfall of a strengthening dollar.

Both of these cities are very affordable, though, so I’d focus on other factors when making your comparisons.

And The Winner Is?

There is no winner. Neither city is better. Manhattan is not inherently better or worse than New Orleans… but it’s a lot different. The same is true for Medellín and Cuenca.

Ecuador is a cultural adventure. Life here is as different as you can get from life in the United States or Canada without leaving the world’s European-based cultures.

Friend Lee Harrison, who launched his own adventures overseas in Cuenca and then, 10 years later, moved to Medellín, puts the lifestyle on offer in these two cities into good perspective.

“When I retired to Cuenca at age 49,” Lee says, “I shunned places like Medellín, Chile, and Uruguay, because they were too much like America. I wanted something as different, enriching, and exciting as I could get, and Cuenca fit the bill.

“When I bought my place in Medellín, 10 years later at the age of 59, it was also exactly what I was looking for… a place to enjoy perfect weather and a sophisticated lifestyle that I couldn’t afford in the United States. By then, Medellín fit the bill.

“Medellín became my ‘ideal retirement spot’… whereas a decade prior it had been Cuenca.”

You’ve heard many times that the “perfect retirement location” is different for everyone. This is true, but it’s not the whole story.

Your “perfect spot” can also change with your age and as you have more experience living abroad. Your ideas about what’s “ideal” for you can evolve over time.

Meaning the adventure and excitement of discovery need never stop.

Kathleen Peddicord

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Kathleen Peddicord

Kathleen Peddicord

Kathleen Peddicord has covered the live, retire, and do business overseas beat for more than 30 years and is considered the world's foremost authority on these subjects. She has traveled to more than 75 countries, invested in real estate in 21, established businesses in 7, renovated historic properties in 6, and educated her children in 4.

Kathleen has moved children, staff, enterprises, household goods, and pets across three continents, from the East Coast of the United States to Waterford, Ireland... then to Paris, France... next to Panama City, where she has based her Live and Invest Overseas business. Most recently, Kathleen and her husband Lief Simon are dividing their time between Panama and Paris.

Kathleen was a partner with Agora Publishing’s International Living group for 23 years. In that capacity, she opened her first office overseas, in Waterford, Ireland, where she managed a staff of up to 30 employees for more than 10 years. Kathleen also opened, staffed, and operated International Living publishing and real estate marketing offices in Panama City, Panama; Granada, Nicaragua; Roatan, Honduras; San Miguel de Allende, Mexico; Quito, Ecuador; and Paris, France.

Kathleen moved on from her role with Agora in 2007 and launched her Live and Invest Overseas group in 2008. In the years since, she has built Live and Invest Overseas into a successful, recognized, and respected multi-million-dollar business that employs a staff of 35 in Panama City and dozens of writers and other resources around the world.

Kathleen has been quoted by The New York Times, Money magazine, MSNBC, Yahoo Finance, the AARP, and beyond. She has appeared often on radio and television (including Bloomberg and CNBC) and speaks regularly on topics to do with living, retiring, investing, and doing business around the world.

In addition to her own daily e-letter, the Overseas Opportunity Letter, with a circulation of more than 300,000 readers, Kathleen writes regularly for U.S. News & World Report and Forbes.

Her newest book, "How to Retire Overseas: Everything You Need to Know to Live Well (for Less) Abroad," published by Penguin Random House, is the culmination of decades of personal experience living and investing around the world.

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