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No Two Retirement Lifestyles Are Created Equal

Kathleen Peddicord by Kathleen Peddicord
Mar 29, 2009
in Lifestyle
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A small market in Panama where items cost only a few cents and there are spices, garlic, and other small items for sale
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Friday, we began revisiting the all-important cost of living question.

It’s nearly impossible, I explained, to say how much it would cost you to live in a place, because your cost of living anywhere depends on how you want to live.

It’s almost not possible, even, to tell you if a place is “cheap” or “expensive,” for those are relative ideas. What’s affordable to me may be costly right now to anyone living, say, in Detroit, where whole houses are reported to be changing hands for US$7,000 or US$8,000. From that vantage point, the entire rest of the world must appear over-priced.

This is perhaps the most asked-about issue we address in these dispatches.

“How much would it cost me to live in Belize?” readers write.

“I have a retirement budget of US$1,400 a month. Could I afford to retire to Panama City?’

“My wife and I have US$2,500 a month in retirement income. Where will that buy us a luxury lifestyle?”

The first big question you must address as you shop the world for the retirement haven with your name on it is this one: What kind of lifestyle will your retirement budget buy you where?

As you work to answer this question, understand one important thing:

No two retirement lifestyles are created equal.

I’ve reported that it’s costing us nearly US$5,000 a month to live in Panama City (US$4,765 is the figure I’ve quoted).

Would it cost you US$5,000 a month to live in this city? I doubt it. Remember:

  • We’re a household of four…which means we’re buying groceries for four…
  • We’re renting (and air conditioning) a four-bedroom place…we need all this space because our residence is right now doubling as our place of business (though we’re outgrowing it and plan to move into separate office space soon)…
  • We’re in a brand-new building in a nice neighborhood, and we’ve got an ocean view…
  • We’re paying for a super-duper cable/Internet package that costs nearly five times as much as a basic package…
  • We have a full-time maid…but maybe you need only part-time help around the house…
  • Etc.

We have friends living in Panama City, comfortably, on US$1,500 a month and less.

Lief and I have been spending a lot of time out in Veraguas Province lately, on the west coast of the Azuero Peninsula, where Lief and a partner are developing land. What would it cost you to live in that beautiful region of this country?

You could rent a house for US$300 a month or less…maybe half that.

Groceries are cheaper than in Panama City by at least 10%. And you can eat lunch or dinner out in the local road-side restaurants for as little as US$2.50 a person.

You’d have to invest in a satellite dish if you wanted your own Internet access. And your biggest expense by far would be a vehicle.

I haven’t tallied the costs carefully (I’m working on that and will report back), but I’d say you (that is, you and a significant other) could live comfortably in this Pacific coast paradise for less than US$1,000 a month, maybe much less.

The real question, though, is: Would you be happy living out here? You have to answer that one for yourself

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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