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Ya-ta Boy
Joined: 16 Jan 2003
Location: Established in 1994
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 Posted: Tue Aug 01, 2006 12:36 am Post subject: What about retiring in Nicaragua? |
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Just saw this on MSN:
"In September 1999, Nicaragua enacted the most attractive -- and most aggressive -- tourism-incentive law in Latin America. If you've ever toyed with the idea of owning your own B&B, running a sailboat charter, leading adventure treks into the jungle, dishing up meals in your own restaurant or operating any kind of tourism-related business, Nicaragua is the place to do it.
Law 306 is sweeping in scope and offers hard-to-beat benefits for investors who take advantage of the program. If your business qualifies, you pay no income- or real-estate taxes for up to 10 years. You can bring in (or buy locally) all the supplies you need -- from furniture and boats to linens and cash registers -- tax- and duty-free.
Incentives for foreign retirees
If you're simply in the market for a place to relax and spend a few months a year in a quiet, safe, affordable retreat, again, Nicaragua is hard to beat. The country's retiree incentive program is much like Costa Rica's was in the 1980s, attracting thousands of expatriates. To be eligible, you need only be over 45 and have a monthly income of at least $400.
The benefits come mostly in the form of tax incentives. As a foreign retiree, you:
pay no taxes on any out-of-country earnings.
can bring into Nicaragua up to $10,000 of household goods for your own home, duty-free.
can import one automobile for personal or general use duty- and tariff-free, and sell it after five years, tax-free.
can import an additional vehicle every five years under the same duty exemptions.
The cost of living in Nicaragua is a fraction what you're used to paying up north. Our sources on the ground say a two-week supply of pork and beef costs about $65. For enough fresh vegetables to feed four or five people daily for a week, expect to pay about $55. A 30-minute consultation with a U.S.-trained physician will cost you about $35. You can hire a maid who will cook, clean and do your laundry for less than $120 a month; and you'll spend just $25 on a wonderful restaurant meal of local delicacies, including with wine and dessert."
***
What other countries have you heard of that are this retirement-friendly?
I know there are lots of cool places, but most are not open for foreigners to retire in, unless you have a bank account that rivals Bill Gates'. |
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Tiger Beer
Joined: 07 Feb 2003
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| Posted: Tue Aug 01, 2006 12:43 am Post subject: Re: What about retiring in Nicaragua? |
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Interesting!
| Ya-ta Boy wrote: |
| What other countries have you heard of that are this retirement-friendly? |
I've heard Panama and Costa Rica are fairly popular in that regard as well.. I wonder if Nicaragua is just jumping on the same bandwagon as it sees the benefits from that.. |
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safeblad
Joined: 17 Jul 2006
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| Posted: Tue Aug 01, 2006 12:46 am Post subject: |
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| Nicaragua could be a great idea. I would carefully watch the elections in November though. If Daniel Ortega wins you might not want to go there. |
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VanIslander
Joined: 18 Aug 2003
Location: Geoje, Hadong, Tongyeong,... now in a small coastal island town outside Gyeongsangnamdo!
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| Posted: Tue Aug 01, 2006 1:26 am Post subject: |
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blaseblasphemener
Joined: 01 Jun 2006
Location: There's a voice, keeps on calling me, down the road, that's where I'll always be
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| Posted: Tue Aug 01, 2006 3:55 am Post subject: |
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| dude, sign me up. no cold Canadian winters! |
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JLarter
Joined: 17 Apr 2006
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| Posted: Tue Aug 01, 2006 6:22 am Post subject: |
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| That looks like a mighty fine place to live! |
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cwemory
Joined: 14 Jan 2006
Location: Gunpo, Korea
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| Posted: Tue Aug 01, 2006 7:27 am Post subject: |
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NPR did a two part special on a similar subject several months ago.
U.S. Baby Boomers Retiring in Panama, Part 1
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5251669
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| An increasing number of retiring "Baby Boomers" are moving to Central America in search of inexpensive property and easy living in a tropical paradise. Honduras, Nicaragua and Panama are now home to thousands of American retirees. In the first of a two-part series, Lourdes Garcia-Navarro reports on how the boom is affecting communities on Panama's Caribbean coast. |
U.S. Baby Boomers Retiring in Panama, Part 2
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5253095
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It's a good bet that most people at one time or another have thought about running away to a tropical paradise. For most, it remains just a fantasy. But booming housing prices in the United States and a rising cost of living for retiring Baby Boomers is prompting more Americans to look to retiring abroad.
Of course, that's not a new idea. But as traditional spots in Mexico and Costa Rica become more expensive, an increasing number of Americans are now buying their own piece of paradise in parts of Central America that were once considered dangerous backwaters -- places such as Honduras, Nicaragua and Panama, previously off-limits because of volatile political climates.
Panama, in particular, is experiencing a real estate boom due largely to American retirees looking to settle down. In the archipelago called Bocas del Toro, the boom is more like a feeding frenzy.
The tourist businesses lining the quaint, unpaved streets of the main town until recently were geared toward the surfing crowd, who have been coming here for years. Now there are dozens of hotels, a gourmet supermarket and spa facilities. There are new faces in the crowd every day.
"A large percentage of the people are going to be Baby Boomers -- people in their 50s who have a lot of equity in their home in the United States, people who don't have much in the way of retirement programs," says Jim McCarren, an American expatriate living on the island for more than nine years. He's taken up selling real estate himself, selling property to fellow Americans.
Many others are getting involved in the boom, selling off parcels of their own land. Tales of unsavory practices abound -- price gouging, developments in sensitive rain forests, stealing land from Indian tribes...
Don King, another expatriate selling real estate on the islands, says development is inevitable.
"But you can try and influence where it happens, where it should happen and where it should not," he says. The real estate frenzy is getting worse as more people find out about this pocket of paradise.
"This is a crazed machine -- these people are coming in on private planes, they are... buying like mad," he says.
Island locals are having a tough time dealing with the changes brought by this gringo buying boom. There are three main local communities here: the English-speaking blacks, originally brought from Jamaica to work the plantations, Spanish-speaking mainlanders, and the Guaymi and Ngobe Bugle Indians.
A boat driver, who asks to be called Chingo, says their traditional lands are being sold off bit by bit. Locals no longer have access to certain areas, and although developers provide employment, he says the wages are too low.
"I don't want to work for $10 a day -- that is no kind of money," he says, speaking in the local English patois. "Plenty people take, 'cause they in need, though."
Michael Martinez, who makes a living catching lobsters, is more blunt about the changes on his island. "Many foreigners are coming and we sell our land to them without thinking about what comes next," he says.
"With the money they give us, we think we are rich -- but they are tricking us. The land then doesn't belong to us anymore, and they are going to throw us out like animals."
Others, like local entrepreneur Caleb Thomas Porter, is much more optimistic. There are problems with corruption, overdevelopment, exploitation and conflict with indigenous tribes -- but in the long run, a rising tide will lift all boats.
"I really see that things is coming good," he says. "Bocas is growing. When a place grows everything grows. The good things grows and the bad things grows, too." |
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animalbirdfish
Joined: 04 Feb 2004
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| Posted: Thu Aug 03, 2006 4:58 am Post subject: |
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They've come a long way...
I'd be down, but I wonder if I could talk my wife into it. How's the sundubu chigae in Central America?
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Marlboro
Joined: 31 Jul 2006
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| Posted: Thu Aug 03, 2006 5:04 am Post subject: |
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I would retire to Scotland,but thats a long way away yet,going to have my clean fresh air, mountains to wake up to, and my very own vegetable patch, maybe some chickens too, because of the colder climate in the highlands, i could spend my time knitting jumpers for them, wow sounds so wonderful writing about it  |
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VanIslander
Joined: 18 Aug 2003
Location: Geoje, Hadong, Tongyeong,... now in a small coastal island town outside Gyeongsangnamdo!
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| Posted: Thu Aug 03, 2006 5:06 am Post subject: |
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| animalbirdfish wrote: |
| I wonder if I could talk my wife into it. How's the sundubu chigae in Central America? |
Tease her about...
1) how close the gochu supply would be!
2) offering to learn yourself how to make tofu
so that
3) she can make sundubu chigae
after all
4) you can't beat homemade!  |
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Ya-ta Boy
Joined: 16 Jan 2003
Location: Established in 1994
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| Posted: Thu Aug 03, 2006 5:24 am Post subject: |
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Hmmm....chickens in cable-knit sweaters. Still trying to get my mind around that one. I tend to think of chickens in olive oil, garlic and rosemary, but to each his own.
I've heard people mention Thailand and the Philippines as places to retire, but just wondering if the laws are as friendly as those in Central America. Personally, I like the ex-pat life, but one thing that I consider is the language. Do I want to always live where communication is a struggle? And (#2) I'm not a fan of these tropical days, so figure year-round tropical weather would not be my cup of tea.
Who knows where it is 82 degrees year round where they speak English in the grocery store and serve hot spicy dinners in the restaurants? Mountains or beaches in the background would be a plus but not an absolute necessity. Access to good bookstores are a necessity. Those are it for my requirements. And the language is negotiable.
Get on it. Plan my retirement. My life is in your hands. Just remember that if you screw up, and it does turn out that there is an afterlife, I will haunt you. That's a promise. |
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Delirium's Brother
Joined: 08 May 2006
Location: Out in that field with Rumi, waiting for you to join us!
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| Posted: Thu Aug 03, 2006 6:15 am Post subject: |
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| Ya-ta Boy wrote: |
Who knows where it is 82 degrees year round where they speak English in the grocery store and serve hot spicy dinners in the restaurants? Mountains or beaches in the background would be a plus but not an absolute necessity. Access to good bookstores are a necessity. Those are it for my requirements. And the language is negotiable. |
Goa, is the first place that popped into my mind.
| Ya-ta Boy wrote: |
| Get on it. Plan my retirement. My life is in your hands. Just remember that if you screw up, and it does turn out that there is an afterlife, I will haunt you. That's a promise. |
Dude, don't make me call my shaman. |
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cosmicgirlie
Joined: 29 Jan 2003
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| Posted: Thu Aug 03, 2006 7:07 am Post subject: |
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I've always maintained I will retire in Panama or Nicaragua. Both have cheap land at the present moment. Costa Rica is a wee bit pricy. Other places to consider, the Maldive or Mauritius. Both have cheaper properties.
Maybe a whole network of Bed and Breakfasts around the world. Muhahahahaha |
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Tiger Beer
Joined: 07 Feb 2003
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| Posted: Fri Aug 04, 2006 3:52 am Post subject: |
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| Ya-ta Boy wrote: |
| I've heard people mention Thailand and the Philippines as places to retire, but just wondering if the laws are as friendly as those in Central America. Personally, I like the ex-pat life, but one thing that I consider is the language. Do I want to always live where communication is a struggle? And (#2) I'm not a fan of these tropical days, so figure year-round tropical weather would not be my cup of tea. |
Philippines with the English would sound good to me. There are a few mountain climates as well there.. Baguio and northern Luzon for example. I'm not too crazy about that area, but its there nontheless.
Reading that posted article by cwemory makes me a bit nervous though. You can almost feel the tension with that. And those Central American countries are extremely small! Its not like Philippines for example, where you can more or less get lost in the overwhelming majority Filipinos of it. Seems like C.A. you'd be a member of an actual group and represent a group actively taking land from locals/indigeneous/etc.
| cosmicgirlie wrote: |
I've always maintained I will retire in Panama or Nicaragua. Both have cheap land at the present moment. Costa Rica is a wee bit pricy. Other places to consider, the Maldive or Mauritius. Both have cheaper properties.
Maybe a whole network of Bed and Breakfasts around the world. Muhahahahaha |
Mauritius has cheap land? I always thought the demograhics of that island looks really cool! I always thought it was quite expensive however. |
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ddeubel
Joined: 20 Jul 2005
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| Posted: Fri Aug 04, 2006 5:18 am Post subject: |
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guys,
If you plan on going to Nicaragua, don't plan on bringing a woman or having a woman (as a Westerner). Lots end up as dead carcasses never claimed. Glaring problem.
Too many U.S. trained killers now with nothing better to do. Atleast one senator has owned up to their complicity but don't expect peace and quiet down there unless you keep a few body guards. No wonder they need such incentives!
If you are a woman in Nicaragua, you are worth less than a piece of steak........it is the truth unfortunately. Nice report here if you follow this sort of thing or care http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/crossing_continents/294533.stm
especially considering it is Ortega's stepdaughter.......and what happened to him??? nada.
But hey, if you are the average joe who wants someone to cling to them, might be a bet...seems like a lot of GI Joes here on this board. Gun toting, kill all them "whoever" and let freedom reign. Might be their type of place...
DD |
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