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The first step to moving abroad is to make the right decision.
Obvious, isn't it, but you really must put the appropriate
amount of time into making your decision.
The decision has to be made in two stages:
1. Do I really want to do it?
2. If the answer is 'Yes', where do I want to go to? If it's
'No', do I want to move within the UK?
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Do I Really Want to do it?
Firstly, consider your motives for moving abroad. It may be that
you feel that you want to move abroad because you're fed up with
living in the UK. But that may be because you're unhappy with
work, when you really come to analyse it, so you do need to
examine why you want to move abroad. The following may be
amongst your reasons:
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1. You want to raise money from your property so you have more
for your retirement. So moving abroad to a cheaper property
meets that requirement.
2. You want to live in a warmer climate
3. You want or need a cheaper cost of living in retirement
4. You want to join friends or family
5. You want to 'escape' the hustle and bustle of the UK and move
somewhere slower and quieter
There may be other reasons, too, but whatever they may be
examine them closely, talk about them to your partner, if you
have one, to friends, family and anyone you know who might have
done it or thought about and investigated it.
Let's now look at the other side of the coin, play devil's
advocate and consider why some of the reasons for moving abroad
may not be as sound as they should be:
1. Remember all the extra costs that moving abroad entails. You
will have to pay solicitors' fees, a removals company and any
fees to people and organisations in the country to which you are
moving. These latter will vary from place to place. You need to
find out all the costs, including on-going costs such as the
local equivalent of council tax etc before making the decision.
2. A warmer climate is wonderful but remember that the UK seems
to be getting warmer year by year, and very often temperatures
in parts of the UK are warmer than those in some places much
further south. If climate is the only reason for your move,
think carefully.
3. We all want cheaper living costs but be careful. Do a budget
of how much you believe you will spend per month or year in the
UK in your retirement and then one for your expenditure in the
location to which you are thinking of moving. Once you have done
this and established that you will be spending less if you move
abroad, then remember and include things that might be relevant
such as medical costs, flights home, the cost of sending
presents home for the children and/or grandchildren and so on.
Rack your brains to think of any and all extra expenditure.
4. Joining friends or family is excellent. Remember, though,
that their circumstances may change, necessitating a future move
on their part. Consider if you still want to be abroad if
they're not there.
5. There may be hustle and bustle in the UK but where you move
to may prove too quiet. You know the saying, 'The grass is
always greener on the other side of the fence.' Be careful that
you are not being overly-enthusiastic about moving abroad to your
potential new location.
A Way of Helping You Make the Decision
Inevitably, moving is a decision based on some emotion - you
like the look of somewhere and your heart says that you'll be
happy there. There's nothing wrong with this except that some
objectivity should be added to the emotion.
One way of doing this is to rank and score the criteria you want
from where you live. So, do this 5-step exercise.
1. Write down your top 15, say, criteria for a place to live.
e.g. warm climate, cheap cost of living, close to friends etc.
2. Put your criteria in order of importance, with the most
important one at 15 and the least at 1.
3. Score where you live now against each of the criteria, giving
two points if it matches it very well, one if it matches
moderately and none if it matches it poorly or not at all. Then
multiply the score by the criterion position. So the most
important will score 2 x 15, 1 x 15 or 0 x 15. The least
important will score 2 x 1, 1 x 1 or 0 x 1.
4. Add all the scores. For 15 criteria, the maximum will be 240.
If your area scores 180 or more think very carefully about
moving because your current area obviously suits you very well.
On the other hand, if the score is under 60, your thoughts about
moving have probably been confirmed!
5. Score all the locations that you look at against your
criteria and the one that scores the highest is where you should
concentrate your efforts.
Don't forget that once you have decided on a location, you can
change your criteria to those you want from a property and then
repeat the process for all the properties that you are shown.
Scoring all your potential areas means that you have to research
them first, so make sure that your research is thorough. To help
you do this, go to our
Doing
your Research page.
Ensure, too, that you read all the other pages in this Guide.
You can reach them through the links in the box.
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