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    • Home
    • Countries

      Top Destinations:

      Whether you’re looking for fun and sun, a peaceful retirement, or the chance to earn some extra income, you’ve got a real world of opportunity open to you… In short, we’ve done our best to narrow down your best options, but only you can decide the right country for you.

      • Spain
      • Portugal
      • Panama
      • Belize
      • Colombia
      • Cyprus
      • Mexico
      • France
      • Montenegro
      • Browse All Countries

      Best For:

      • The Best Places To Retire
      • Health Care Abroad
      • Cost Of Living
      • Investing in Real Estate
      • Establishing Residency
      • Gun Laws In The World
      • English-Speaking Countries
      • Safest Places For Retirement
      • Best Places In Latin America
    • Budgets

      How Much Will It Cost You To Live Overseas?

      The only honest answer is, we have no idea. And neither does anyone else. The only one who can answer that question is you. Here’s the most important thing to understand about budgeting your new life overseas…

      Super Cheap

      • Chitré, Panama
      • Santa Marta, Colombia
      • Phuket, Thailand
      • Dumaguete, The Philippines

      Cheap

      • Medellin, Colombia
      • Boquete, Panama
      • Kyrenia, Cyprus
      • Hua Hin, Thailand
      • The Algarve, Portugal

      Affordable

      • Valencia, Spain
      • Cascais, Portugal
      • Las Terrenas, The DR
      • Pisa, Italy
      • La Rochelle, France
      • Mazatlán, Mexico

      Luxury

      • Ambergris Caye, Belize
      • Kotor, Montenegro
      • The Panama City Beaches
      • Paris, France
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      Follow Us:

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      Join our Weekly Newsletter
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      Sign up for our weekly newsletter to receive expert insights on the best international real estate investment opportunities.






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        • Discover tips and strategies used by global property investing veterans

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        VALENCIA, SPAIN

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        PANAMA CITY, PANAMA

        Oct. 15-17, 2025

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      Home Retirement/Living

      A Fatal Social Security Mistake

      by Lief Simon
      Apr 25, 2024
      in Retirement/Living
      0 0
      A rock gargoyle sits atop of a building in Paris, France

      AdobeStock/Phil_Good

      When Benjmain Franklin wrote, “…in this world nothing can be said to be certain, except death and taxes” few could argue his position.

      Today, however, it’s a different story and alas it’s not taxes that are in doubt but rather one’s own existence… or lack thereof.

      You see Mr Franklin lived and died long before the Social Security Administration was established and longer still before that organization began compiling its Death Master File.

      The Death Master File is a computer database holding information on over 100 million deceased individuals who held Social Security numbers and whose deaths were reported to the Administration.

      It’s used by banks, the IRS, Medicare, law enforcement, and the like to match records and prevent identity fraud.

      Once you make the list, you’re dead. No exceptions.

      Except… when you’re not.

      Case in point: Don Pilger. When Don reported the death of his wife to the Social Security Administration they wrongly listed him as dead instead—a discovery he made when he found himself locked out of his bank account.

      Then there was Judy Rivers. Her name incorrectly made its way onto the Death Master File and it led to her being arrested on suspicion of identity fraud and financially ruined. When she protested her existence to a credit agency she was told to send in her information for their consideration.

      Next was the Boston doctor for whom the news of one of his patient’s deaths—discovered when he went to renew a prescription for the man—came as a shock. A bigger shock still came when he called the man’s family to offer his condolences only for the “deceased” to answer the phone.

      The man explained how he learned of his own demise when he lost access to his bank accounts, had his health insurance cancelled, and his Social Security payments cut off.

      A clerical error was the likely culprit in each case—and in the cases of the hundreds of alive and kicking individuals who somehow make the list each month—but in many ways the bigger problem is the reliance on technology.

      If the computer says it, it must be so.

      And it’s not just a problem in the U.S.

      In 1999 the U.K. Post Office introduced a new accounting and stocktaking system called Horizon. Postmasters in charge of branches across the country quickly noticed glitches in the system were creating non-existent shortfalls for huge sums of money but their concerns were dismissed.

      With the shortfalls continuing to show up in accounts, the Post Office—so convinced that the numbers couldn’t lie—pursued its postmasters for the “missing” money. As a result, hundreds of people were wrongly convicted for theft, fraud, and false accounting based on the faulty data before the scandal finally came to light.

      Start Your New Life Overseas Today!
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      We Value Your Privacy! We will not share your email address with anyone else, period.
      I was reminded once again of just how much people prefer to rely on technology over reality when trying to ascertain the status of a flight from  Panama to Paris and handle a subsequent rebooking recently.

      Computers offered a detour through Istanbul… An overnight layover in Colombia…

      My “no change” ticket was, the computer confirmed, 100% cancelled, yet I wound up with two seats booked in my name…

      And it struck me that some ground staff seem more confident of a plane’s arrival not from the thunder of jet engines and appearance of an Airbus outside the window but rather from a flashing confirmation on their computer screen.

      So it goes.

      As to a solution to this ever-worsening problem…

      While on hold to the airline I gave serious consideration to becoming an IT expert and figuring out a way to take us all offline permanently, but the time and logistics involved rule it out for now.

      Instead, I take comfort in the fact that even if my name accidentally wound up on the Death Master File in the morning I’d still exist somewhere in the world…

      In the countries outside home borders where I’ve planted flags… Panama, for example, where I’ve staked my claim at Los Islotes… and in Ireland where I hold a passport… and in the various other countries where I hold bank accounts and real estate…

      It’s a way to protect yourself and your assetsfrom events outside of your control, be they wars, financial crashes, or killer computer glitches…

      Stay diversified,

      Lief Simon

      Lief Simon

      Editor,Offshore Living Letter

      Tags: 'Expat Life''moving overseas'Move abroad
      Share88Tweet52
      Lief Simon

      Lief Simon

      Lief Simon has lived and worked in 7 countries on 5 continents and traveled to more than 75 countries. His real estate investment career began with a $5,000 down payment on a three-flat building in Chicago. Less than three years later, Lief sold the building for a leveraged return of 3,000%—$150,000 in profit after closing costs and commissions.

      From there, he turned his attention overseas and has bought property in 24 countries including France, Croatia, Portugal, Ireland, Belize, Spain, Argentina, Cyprus, Romania, and beyond. Thanks to his decades-long career as a global property investor, Lief has built a multi-million-dollar portfolio that includes rental properties, significant land holdings, and 7 personal residences.

      Lief has established residency in 3 countries and acquired a second passport from Ireland.

      In 2008 Lief and wife Kathleen Peddicord made the most important investment of their lives—a 215-acre oceanside finca, known as Los Islotes. There, on Panama’s largely undiscovered Veraguas coast, they’ve installed underground electricity, water, and internet and built a forever family home that sits at the heart of their ultimate vision: a gold standard private residential community for those in search of a true safe haven escape.

      Lief’s latest book, “Cowboy Millionaire—The New American Pioneer,” collects all the wisdom he has learned in three decades of living and investing outside America.

      He offers advice on international diversification in his twice-weekly Offshore Living Letter and monthly Simon Letter dispatches. For real estate investment opportunities, check out his monthly Global Property Advisor service.

      If you’d like to meet Lief in person, join him for one of our upcoming in-country conferences. You’ll find further details here.

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      Top Countries

      • Spain
      • Portugal
      • Panama
      • Belize
      • Colombia
      • Cyprus
      • Mexico
      • France
      • Montenegro

      Best For:

      • Health Care Abroad
      • Retirement Living
      • Cost Of Living
      • Investing in Real Estate
      • Establishing Residency
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      • English Speakers
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      BROWSE ALL COUNTRIES

      Budgets

      How Much Will It Cost
      To Live Overseas?

      Super Cheap

      • Chitré, Panama
      • Santa Marta, Colombia
      • Phuket, Thailand
      • Dumaguete, The Philippines

      Cheap

      • Medellin, Colombia
      • Boquete, Panama
      • Kyrenia, Cyprus
      • Hua Hin, Thailand
      • The Algarve, Portugal

      Affordable

      • Valencia, Spain
      • Cascais, Portugal
      • Las Terrenas, The DR
      • Pisa, Italy
      • La Rochelle, France
      • Mazatlán, Mexico

      Luxury

      • Ambergris Caye, Belize
      • Kotor, Montenegro
      • The Panama City Beaches
      • Paris, France

      Resources

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