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Second Citizenships, Residencies, and/or Temporary Relocation

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Re: Second Citizenships, Residencies, and/or Temporary Relocation

#251

Post by vecinu »

blackbear_ wrote: post #153
ChuckNorris89 wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>One of my friends just left Munich for Colorado, he said houses are still too expensive in major German cities and salaries too low. Thanks for pointing this out as it is very important information to have vs. everything we hear about Germany being "the best place in the world" and "you don't need to buy property as everyone here rents" .

If you need another data point, my partner and I only pay about 25% of our combined after-tax salary in rent, living in a "major German city" (both employed in STEM). Factor in an additional 10/15% for living costs and we are left with significant disposable income, in my eyes.

Do you foresee being able to purchase a home in the next 10-15 years? I think the problem with renting for a long time (I'm a renter, my wealth is growing in other investments) is assets are inflating in value, housing is becoming more and more expensive.

If you can't buy now, with "significant disposable income", will you be able to buy later? That is, if you care for home ownership at all.

FAANG/SV engineers could buy a home pretty much in any major city after some years in the industry. I have heard that is not the case in Munich, Frankfurt, Zurich, etc...

Re: Second Citizenships, Residencies, and/or Temporary Relocation

#252

Post by vecinu »

tonfa wrote: post #143
vecinu wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thanks for sharing. I spent some time in Europe albeit that was a long time ago and I feel like I was too young to experience the hardships of life I'm facing in the US. I know the safety nets you're referring to, they're there for health care, unemployment and worker rights. Things that don't really exist for most people in the US if they're unemployed or in a regular job. I'm lucky to be in a well paid, high lucrat…

> I keep hearing how I'll just have to swallow a tiny salary compared to SV wages if I move to any EU country, Switzerland included. Did you check e.g. levels.fyi?

I have and can validate its fairly accurate numbers for FAANG / SV salaries but not so much European ones.

It also gets hairy once you compare pre-tax (US Salaries) with post-tax (EU salaries) and different costs of living.

I use a combination of levels.fyi, Payscale/Glassdoor plus Numbeo / Nomadlist to keep running the numbers around how much I could save by moving elsewhere.

Re: Second Citizenships, Residencies, and/or Temporary Relocation

#253

Post by vecinu »

ChuckNorris89 wrote: post #140
vecinu wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's interesting, I have a Romanian passport but didn't live long enough there to actually get a feel for what life is like day to day. I think being a worker and having to have a job in RO would be soul crushing, from what I hear from friends and family. Portugal seems a great in between if you can swing a remote job, a lot of tech workers prefer it for the low cost of living and climate, like you said. It seems w…

>I think being a worker and having to have a job in RO would be soul crushing, from what I hear from friends and family. Overall, for most of the population, yes. However, if you're a tech worker, no, as that puts you in the top %10 of earners. In many ways, Romania is like the US, high inequality, low taxes, and poor quality social services, unless you have a corporate job, then you can live like a King as the huge…

> In many ways, Romania is like the US

This made me chuckle, I often compare California to Romania (since I know both places well) and can contrast the corruption, money waste, terrible infrastructure and inequality in a way that friends / family that moved from Romania can't agree with.

They always paint Romania as a third world *hole that's incomparable to the US/Canada or other "civilized" countries.

I follow the news, political developments and have friends there so I'm aware how far it's gotten in the last 2 decades, I'm pretty proud of the direction they're heading in.

The only caveat I have for you with living in RO vs the US is the healthcare system. Even if you opt for private care, the really good doctors, the emergency procedures that need to be done in public hospitals are a disgrace. At least in the US if you "live like a king", you can pay for a king's level of healthcare.

In RO, you literally have to fly to Germany/Switzerland or elsewhere to get quality healthcare and if you have a really bad accident, you may not make it to the hospital to get the care you need.

That's the one thing keeping me from moving to RO today, even with its extremely low cost of living. I can't risk my family's health on the disastrous healthcare system there.

Re: Second Citizenships, Residencies, and/or Temporary Relocation

#254

Post by vecinu »

adrianN wrote: post #207
vecinu wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> What do you need this wealth for? Insurance for the future. Maybe I get bored of software, maybe I want to take a few years off and not have to work. Maybe I won't be able to "unprogram" the consumerist habits I picked up in the US and will fall back into buying things I don't really need (like Hi-Fi, photography equipment, gaming rigs, TVs, etc...) and will need funds to continue doing that. I don't know, I guess…

A million dollars is 20k per year for fifty years. You can life pretty well off that in one of the poorer European countries, or in a poorer area of a richer European country.

You can "safely" withdraw between 3-4% of your $1M for 30 years and never lose that $1M, assuming you keep that money invested and it grows at an average of 7%/yr.

$30-40k/yr, pre-tax, would still be ok for one person in Portugal / Spain or other lower cost of living places, right NOW. Once you add in a spouse, children, things start to get hairy.

Once you consider that these places are currently undervalued and their cost of living could increase dramatically in the future, that $30-40k/yr no longer seems as safe.

I would personally aim for $2M+ to feel safe that I won't have to be forced to work a job I hate for the next 30 years.

Re: Second Citizenships, Residencies, and/or Temporary Relocation

#255

Post by vecinu »

tonfa wrote: post #149
vecinu wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Correct but with an optimistic projection of working for 5-10 more years, I could stop working forever, unless I want to work for fun / enjoyment (or say no to crappy jobs) and then move to the EU. If I move to the EU now and take a hit in income, that will become impossible.

Germany median salary is 42k EUR (and I guess one of the highest in the eurozone, Portugal seem to be 25k USD), depending on your lifestyle, I think many people could actually retire with 1M...

Once you extrapolate that to software engineers, levels.fyi says you can expect 80k EUR/yr in Germany [1] which I think is after-tax.

If that is true, it's more than I thought it would be and I think if you found a good job you enjoyed, making 80k EUR/yr on top of having $1M saved could give you a secure financial future.

[1] https://www.levels.fyi/Salaries/Software-Engineer/Germany/

Re: Second Citizenships, Residencies, and/or Temporary Relocation

#256

Post by ChuckNorris89 »

blackbear_ wrote: post #232
ChuckNorris89 wrote: post #209

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So you're making those numbers as PhD students instead of workers? Where do I sign up? ;) What domain are you in if you don't mind me asking?

Sorry I wasn't clear, my partner is an IT consultant in a large firm and there you can earn 90k or more in senior positions (say five years in). I get 55k as a PhD student and this is mandated by law, but you can get less if you don't have teaching duties.

What exactly does an IT consultant do, vs let's say, a SW developer?

Re: Second Citizenships, Residencies, and/or Temporary Relocation

#257

Post by tim333 »

tonfa wrote: post #236
jahewson wrote: post #225

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Switzerland has a tax treaty with the US which avoids double-taxation. https://sigtax.com/en/switzerland-united-states-tax-treaty

Yes, most countries do so you're not double taxed. But you still need to declare, and esp. for Switzerland likely pay extra taxes to the US.

The UK has a tax treaty with the US but it didn't stop one Boris Johnson being hit with many thousands in US taxes when he sold his house in spite of having lived in the UK most of his life.

Re: Second Citizenships, Residencies, and/or Temporary Relocation

#258

Post by [deleted] »

mdasen wrote: post #85
1996 wrote: post #31

The mention of Puerto Rico giving citizenship after 1 year is funny. I thought it was part of the US! I wonder what the conditions are for PR citizenship!

Spain offers an easier pathway to citizenship for citizens of Ibero-American countries (basically Latin America) and that includes Puerto Rico. The idea is that, if you're an American, you could get PR citizenship status with one year and then Spain would give you citizenship with only two years. You might consider the PR citizenship to not actually be a "citizenship" but merely a residency status (like how you might…

[deleted]

Re: Second Citizenships, Residencies, and/or Temporary Relocation

#259

Post by josephg »

1996 wrote: post #210
josephg wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

During the covid crisis I’ve stopped telling my American friends about the situation here in Australia. There’s been some political mud throwing about which state managed it best - but we brought the numbers to zero, and have done it as a nation several times now. Since covid, talking to my friends in the USA about Australia feels like punching down. You might have more earning potential in the US, but I’d much rathe…

> Since covid, talking to my friends in the USA about Australia feels like punching down. Funny, talking to my friends in Asia (to which I consider Australia/NZ to be a part of) it feels the exact same way! I can tell them how I go anywhere without wearing a mask, some people make snide remarks but that's it - while they have to declare their address in restaurants, and face all kind of restrictions like not being ab…

> face all kind of restrictions

I’m not going to lie, it’s been tough sometimes. Masks are no big deal. It’s the occasional city wide lockdowns have been the worst. But the USA has just shy of 500 000 deaths. (There are 440k men/430k women in SF, if that gives you a sense of the scale of the tragedy). We only had 909 deaths in Australia.

Maybe to you those deaths were worth it so you didn’t have to wear masks? That’s horrific, and I don’t know how to respond to that. I suppose we are different.

Re: Second Citizenships, Residencies, and/or Temporary Relocation

#260

Post by fakedang »

tharkun__ wrote: post #246
mrsaint wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are exceptions to the rule (for reference see https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multiple_citizenship ). Generally, a lot depends on whether you acquired citizenship by descent or birth, or acquired it by naturalization. Also, there are agreements between countries that you must consider. For example, had Croatia not entered the EU a couple of years ago, it would not have been possible most likely to aquire citize…

Not entirely correct. With a Beibehaltungsgenehmigung you can also obtain other citizenships than what you mentioned and it doesn't need to be by birth. They do make you answer all sorts of questions though to give you that certificate. Source: we went through it. We also had a similar-ish experience passport wise while the kids had non-German passports only while we only had a German one. We held up the line of cars…

What GP meant was that USA treated the child as a US citizen by descent, in spite of the lack of a passport, which is why immigration mandated that the child should have been issued a US passport before traveling to the US. It's natural for a lot of countries that allow dual citizenship to mandate that you travel to said country with the passport of that place.
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