Upgrade Your Lifestyle and Slash Your Costs

Editor’s Note: This story originally appeared on Live and Invest Overseas.

If you’re after the best quality of life for your future — without any danger of burning through your nest egg — you should be looking one place right now: Latin America.

No matter what kind of lifestyle you’re after, no matter what size budget you have to play with, there’s a place in this part of the world with your name on it.

Find Your Dream Home

You could escape to your dream home overlooking the crashing Pacific waves or live steps from the powder sand and gentle waters of the Caribbean.

Maybe you’d prefer a sophisticated city, full of Old World charm, where you’d never be short on entertainment.

Or spend your days riding through the foothills of the southern Sierras … and nights unwinding under the stars with a glass of wine from your own boutique vineyard.

These kinds of experiences are a reality for hundreds of expats I know personally and for thousands of expats I’ve heard from over the years.

And you can join them for half (or less) than you’d pay for the same privileges in the United States.

In fact, the cost of living can be so low that many folks are breaking from the rat race and retiring south of the border years earlier than they planned.

How Lee Retired at 49

At 49, Lee quit his engineering job in New York, with just modest savings, and moved with his wife to a historic city in Ecuador — a place you can live the good life today for around $1,000 a month.

Lowering Your Cost of Living From $8,000 to $3,000

Carole and Dave retired from Virginia to Colombia’s “City of Eternal Spring” — Medellin — where they cut their cost of living from $8,000 to $3,000 a month.

“We could live more frugally,” Carole says, “but we don’t want to, and we don’t have to.”

Don’t Give Up on Your Retirement Dreams

Dusty and Carolyn knew their days in Hawaii — the couple’s original retirement plan — were numbered. So, they turned to Latin America to see where they could stretch their dollars.

“Panama was everything we were looking for in retirement living,” says Dusty. “It has beautiful beaches, a warm climate, lush mountainous terrain (that reminds us of the Hobbit movies), and a large and vibrant expat community.

“We could never have afforded this lifestyle back in the States.

“We eat out three times a week and go to the movies often. Still our full entertainment budget for the month is just $200. Altogether, we’ve cut our cost of living by 75%.”

You, too, have this world of opportunity before you.

Upgrade Your Lifestyle: You Too Can Retire in Latin America

There’s a chance to retire in style, without compromise, and maybe years earlier than you’d planned. In fact, when you see the places — and prices — I’m thinking of, you may find you’re ready to retire right now.

Now, anyone can point you to the cheapest place to retire on the planet. But I understand you want to make a move for a certain lifestyle.

You’ll want services from fast internet to quality health care to nice restaurants. You’ll want to know you’re in a safe place. You’ll want a welcoming community and, probably, some English-speaking neighbors (at least while you get settled in).

Over the past 35 years of exploring, living, investing, and doing business across Latin America, I’ve identified a shortlist of my 10 top havens.

It’s these places — where you can enjoy a luxury retirement on as little as $1,658 (that’s today’s average Social Security check).

What You Can Do in Latin America

Pick up a bottle of award-winning wine for $4, or cool down with an ice-cold beer for $1. Enjoy a steak dinner with all the trimmings at a beachside restaurant for less than $10.

Rent a three-bed apartment in the most sophisticated city south of the border for $313 a month.

Own a brand-new condo, a couple of minutes’ walk from pure Caribbean shores, for $99,900.

See a doctor or consultant, for example, for a quarter the cost in the United States and pick up your prescription drugs for 85% less.

Have a full-time maid — who’ll also cook meals — for $150 a month.

Get the bus across town for 50 cents … or take a taxi for $2.

Latin America Is Not What You Think It Is

Before we take a closer look at these top havens, which we’re going to do over the coming days and weeks, there’s something else you should know about Latin America.

When I started out exploring here in the 1980s, I’d have called most of Latin America third-world. No question. But today, the sands are shifting. In some places, the changes are dramatic.

Panama, for example, is barely recognizable from my first visit in the 1990s. In the past 10 years alone, the changes have been extraordinary. The country is working to join the list of first-world nations by 2030. And, from what I see all around me, she’s on track.

But this shift is happening in other parts of Latin America, too. The middle class is growing, it’s educated, and these young, smart professionals want a better lifestyle.

Changes in Latin America

Governments are stepping up. Where you once had a dirt track, today there’s a paved road, even a highway. You have U.S.-style shopping malls, modern hospitals with first-world services, shiny new airports offering daily direct flights.

It’s easier to find your home comforts here. It’s easier than ever to get to and from Latin America and stay connected with friends and family back home.

Bottom line, right now is the most exciting time in decades to be in this under-rated part of the Americas. All around, you can feel the drive, the energy, the sense of freedom — and of opportunity.

Whatever you can dream of you can do it here. And you can do it at an absolutely affordable cost, because, while the quality of life is seriously improved, prices — on almost everything — still qualify as third-world.