So You're An American Looking To Move Out Of The Country

The checklist nobody sends you: visas, the IRS following you abroad, state domicile traps, special tax regimes, money rails, healthcare, and the paperwork sidequest.

The Checklist Nobody Sends You

Gm everyone. So you’ve been doomscrolling flight prices to Lisbon at 1am again. Maybe it’s the cost of living, maybe it’s the remote job that doesn’t care where your laptop sits, maybe you just want to eat tomatoes that taste like tomatoes. Whatever got you here: welcome. Moving abroad is one of the best trades you can make with your one life.

It’s also a trade most people enter with zero research and max leverage. Most people don’t give a damn about the boring logistics until they’re standing in a foreign government office holding the wrong documents. Don’t let that be you.

Here’s the high-level checklist. Print it, screenshot it, tattoo it. Whatever works.

#1: You Can’t Just… Show Up

Biggest misconception in the game. Your US passport gets you into most countries as a tourist for 90 days. It does not let you live there. Living there requires a visa, and every country runs its own menu:

Digital nomad visas. The new meta. Dozens of countries now have them. You keep your remote job, they let you stay. Usually requires proof of income.
Work visas. A local company sponsors you. Hardest to get, most stable once you have it.
Retirement / passive income visas. Show them your pension or portfolio spits out enough monthly, and you’re in.
Student visas. Yes, enrolling in a language school abroad is a legitimate and criminally underrated route.

Bottom line: pick your visa before you pick your neighborhood. The visa determines the country, the timeline, and half your budget. Do this backwards and you’re planning a fantasy.

#2: The IRS Is Coming With You

Deep breath. The US is one of basically two countries on Earth that taxes its citizens no matter where they live. Move to Portugal, Bali, or the moon and you still file a US tax return every year.

Before you rage-quit this post: filing is not the same as paying. There are big, legal shields. The Foreign Earned Income Exclusion lets you exclude six figures of foreign salary from US tax, and foreign tax credits offset most of the rest. Most expats end up owing the IRS little or nothing.

But two things will get you wrecked if you ignore them:

You must actually file to claim those shields. They are not automatic.
FBAR. If your foreign bank accounts total more than $10,000 at any point in the year, even for one afternoon, you have to report them. The penalties for skipping this are genuinely scary, and yes, your new local checking account counts.

Get an expat tax person for year one. It’s a few hundred bucks to not fumble a six-figure mistake. Easiest EV calculation you’ll make all year.

#3: Break Up With Your State Properly

Sneaky one. Federal taxes follow your passport; state taxes follow your “domicile”, and a few states (California, we see you) will keep claiming you as a resident until you formally cut ties. Driver’s license, voter registration, mailing address: close it all out and document when you left. People pay thousands a year to a state they haven’t touched in years, purely out of laziness. Don’t be exit liquidity for Sacramento.

#4: Your New Country Wants To Tax You Too

Here’s the rule of thumb that runs the whole world: spend 183+ days in a country in a year, and you’re probably a tax resident there. That means their tax system applies to you.

Sounds bad, but here’s the alpha: tons of countries actively court foreigners with special tax regimes. Flat rates, exemptions on foreign income, multi-year discounts. Spain, Italy, Portugal, Greece and others all run some version of this. The catch? These deals almost always have strict application deadlines. Some expire within months of your arrival, and missing them is permanent. Know your target country’s regime before you land, not after.

#5: Money Logistics (Boring, Do It Anyway)

Tell your bank and brokerage you’re leaving. Some US brokerages restrict or straight-up close accounts for overseas residents. Find out their policy before you move, not when you’re locked out of your own portfolio.
Get a no-foreign-fee credit card. Paying 3% on every single purchase abroad is a self-imposed tax on being unprepared.
Use a real transfer service (Wise and friends) for moving money across borders. Airport currency desks and bank wire spreads are where your money goes to die.
Keep one US bank account and one US phone number (a cheap eSIM plan works) alive. Half of American life, from banks to brokers to two-factor texts, assumes you still exist domestically.

#6: Healthcare: Cheaper Than You Think

Genuinely good news for once. In most of the world, healthcare costs a fraction of US prices, and quality in major cities is excellent. Most visas require you to carry health insurance anyway, and private expat plans often run less per year than some Americans pay per month. Get the required coverage, then go be shocked when a doctor’s visit costs less than your old copay.

#7: The Paperwork Sidequest

Every country’s residency process wants documents, and they want them official. Start collecting early:

Passport with 6+ months of validity (renew now if you’re close)
FBI background check. And here’s the trap: it usually needs an apostille (an international authentication stamp), which takes weeks
Birth certificate, marriage certificate: also often apostilled
Certified translations of everything, done by translators your target country recognizes

This is the slowest, most annoying part of the entire move. Start it three months before you think you need to.

#8: Rent First. Always.

Whatever country’s real estate you’ve been fantasy-shopping on your phone: cool it. Rent for at least six months before buying anything. The neighborhood that looks perfect online might be a tourist zone that’s dead in winter. The city might not be your city. Renting is the cheap option on the whole country; buying immediately is going all-in on the first thing you see.

Bottom Line

Moving abroad isn’t one big decision. It’s about eight medium ones, in the right order: visa, taxes (both countries), money rails, healthcare, paperwork, housing. Get the sequence right and the move is smoother than you’d believe. Get it wrong and you’re learning each lesson at full retail price.

The people living their best lives abroad aren’t luckier than you. They just did the boring stuff first.

Stay safe out there. And start collecting those documents.