In this report, I explain How to avoid con artist lovers in overseas retirement.
Here are the top 6 things you can do to reduce the chances you will go broke in the Philippines during retirement.
While I explain how to keep your money, I will show you pictures I took while traveling all over the world, including the Philippines, 65 countries so far. This is Dan of Vagabond Buddha. The beautiful woman you see in my photos is Qiang Hui of Hobo Ventures.
I will use the name Taylor in this report to explain the bad choices to avoid in the Philippines. But Taylor is not a real person. The name Taylor just represents the hundreds of ex-pats, both men and women, that moved to the Philippines for a better life. But instead of a better life, gave their retirement nest egg away without a gun to their head simply by making a series of bad choices.
Taylor went home penniless with a broken heart. You may get your heart broken in the Philippines, but you should keep your money, so you can enjoy the final years of your life. You may even find true love if you can keep your money long enough.
You are probably thinking that I am going to blame a younger beautiful person for ruining Taylor’s life. But the truth is, the Philippines are no different than any other country. There are beautiful people all over the world willing to take Taylor to the cleaners, milk them dry, and leave them hungry on the side of the road.
This reality is not unique to the Philippines. People of poor character live all over the world. Just like every other country in the world, there are probably 99 good people in the Philippines for every bad apple. So you will not protect yourself from bad actors by avoiding the Philippines.
But if you are smart, you can probably go anywhere in the world and keep your retirement nest egg, even stay in your home country. You just need some common sense and knowledge about how con artists take your retirement nest egg. The tips I share apply no matter where you retire, even if you stay in your home country.
What Do You Have to Lose?
Most of my audience are people planning to retire cheap overseas. Many have decided to retire in places like the Philippines, Thailand, Mexico, Central or South America, or Eastern Europe.
Con artists are after your life savings, your pension, and any other assets you have that they can easily separate from you. They can be in the same room as you or across the world on the Internet. I will limit this discussion to the ones in the same room as you. So how do you protect yourself from them? How do you stop them from taking those things from you?
First, let me remind you, we are not talking about the 99 good people. We are just talking about that one bad apple, a con artist, you are trying to protect yourself from. The bad news is that it doesn’t say con artist on their T-shirt. There is no con artist tattoo on them.
How to Keep Your Retirement Nest Egg
Taylor should not have told his potential new lover about his retirement assets. Do not share information with anyone. Keep your mouth shut about your individual resources and your net worth. Do not share account numbers, passwords, or banking pin numbers with anyone. Keep your own email account, your own phone, and your own separate banking. Password protect any electronic equipment you use for banking.
Do not share your computer or smartphone with anyone. If someone in your life needs a computer, buy them a computer. All of your financial data is likely somewhere on your computer or smartphone. Password protect your computer and smartphone and don’t share the password with anyone.
If Taylor wanted to give money to his new love, he should just give them the cash or transfer the money into their account. Joint accounts are a bad idea. If you want to give someone money, do that, but don’t add them to your accounts, or issue them credit or debit cards on your account.
Some of you are thinking … Taylor should trust his new lover or wife. In fact, that is what your new love will say to you whether or not they are a con artist. They will say that trust is the foundation of a relationship. Without that, you have nothing. In fact, that is what all the books about love say.
Sadly, even a con artist will say these words to Taylor.
Trust is everything right? Well, that would be true if Taylor was 25 years old. But Taylor is 60+ years old now. Taylor doesn’t have enough time to rebuild their retirement nest egg. Once it is gone, it is gone, at this age. Trust will not provide room and board for Taylor. Taylor needs that retirement nest egg. If Taylor’s lover turns out to be a con artist, trust won’t help Taylor.
If the con artist doesn’t have access to your accounts, and they don’t know where you are keeping the money, it will be much harder for your life savings to just disappear in thin air. For more on this topic, read my report, How To Travel the World Safely.
Do you know how long it takes to determine whether or not someone is a con artist? I don’t know either. So keep your mouth shut for a very long time.
But teh truth is, you are more dangerous to yourself than a con artist. Do you know why? Because you will drop your guard when you fall in love. In this next example, Taylor just gives his house away to someone he loves.
How to Keep Your House
The first thing Taylor wanted to do when they fell in love was to buy a house to live happily ever after in. If you can afford to give a house away, and you will still have enough money left over so you can walk away with a smile on your face without ever getting a dime back, then buy a house in a foreign country.
There is no need to take notes as you listen. I will provide a link to this content in writing at the end of this video. And while you are there, make sure to grab a free copy of my eBook, How I Fired My Boss and Traveled the World for 15+ Years.
In most of the world, if you get married, buy a house, and move in with your new spouse, plan on giving that house away, with zero dollars returned to you. If your relationship does not work out, pack your shit and walk away. That is just the way of the world. A local con artist or their friends will almost always figure out a way to get you out of that house, legally, or illegally, without refunding a dime to you.
You can argue all you want, but the rights you think you have in your home country don’t necessarily apply like you think they do, in most of the rest of the world.
The way to avoid losing this money is to keep your house in your home country. Have a property manager rent it out and wire you the money each month into your home country bank. Then use the rent you receive to pay the rent in the foreign country you are living in. For more on this topic, read my report, Why Ex-Pats Should Not Buy Real Estate Overseas.
But do speak with a divorce lawyer in your home country to make sure you get to keep the house in your home country before you decide to get married in a foreign country. Have the lawyer set up a trust or other estate plan. A good lawyer will be able to make sure your retirement assets survive a divorce in a foreign country, including your house in your home country. Do all of that before tying the knot.
Now I am not telling you that you should not buy someone you love a new house. I am also not telling you that you shouldn’t leave your house to someone you love when you die. I am just telling you ways to try to keep enough of your money so you remain happy and healthy until you die. It is no fun to go broke when you are too old to start over again.
You see, you are retired now. But if you give it away or lose it before you die, that is not going to be as fun a retirement as you could have had. It would be better to make your retirement money last until you are dead. Then you just leave it to whoever treated you right until the end. If someone turns out to be a bad apple, it is too late to protect your money once it is gone.
So just rent in a foreign country. Then nobody can take a house away from you that you can’t afford to happily lose with a smile on your face.
Where to Keep Your Retirement Nest Egg
In my report about International Banking Mistakes Ex-Pat Retiree’s Make (link provided), I explain that I have decided to keep my retirement nest egg in my home country’s bank and brokerage accounts. The same banks I have used and trusted for 40 years in my home country.
I don’t open bank accounts in foreign countries. I just take money out at ATMs as needed in foreign countries. I use a Charles Schwab ATM card to pull money out of ATMs in foreign countries. Refuse the conversions offered at the foreign ATM machines and I let Schwab do the conversion to the local currency for a better rate. My Schwab account also rebates the foreign ATM fees, which add up fast.
I just trickle money into the foreign country where I am located as needed. So I never have large sums if someone decides to just run off with my cash on hand, which has never happened by the way. But be sure to read all of my other tips in my International Banking report.
How to Not Be The Bank For Your Lover or Their Family
You have probably read the stories about how some ex-pat ended up just giving all of their money away to their lover’s family in the Philippines.
Here are my thoughts on how to avoid that. If Taylor doesn’t talk about their pension, savings, or other retirement assets, then their lover doesn’t really have any conversational leverage to make him feel bad for not supporting their entire family in the Philippines or any other country.
So, instead of bragging about how much money Taylor has on the first date, Taylor just mentions what his available monthly retirement budget is. Here is how that helps. On the first date, Taylor’s new lover would hear that Taylor has a meager budget of $1000 or $1600 USD per month for retirement.
If the potential new love is a con artist, this might end the possibility of the second date. But if they are as sincere as Taylor, and are not a con artist, and they really liked Taylor, there would likely be a second date.
How does this help Taylor in the long run? With a budget of $1600 per month, it is unlikely to cause their lover or family to expect money all the time.
Taylor could then say, “Baby, that is my retirement budget, so if you want to give some away each month, the amount we give would need to be deducted from the $1600 we have each month?” When the money given away each month must come out of this monthly budget, the lover’s passion for giving money to their family and friends would likely be much lower.
Under those circumstances, since the family knows nothing more, Taylor is unlikely to receive constant requests for money. Since Taylor didn’t play big man on campus on the first date, Taylor is more likely to end up with a lover at his side with good intentions. In the information vacuum, Taylor is likely to have a much better experience retired in the Philippines.
The other choice is to just say no when people ask for money. But some people don’t have that much backbone. Love can be very intoxicating. So it is easier to set up the relationship correctly in the beginning than it is to maintain a steady stream of refusals when your lover and family ask for money.
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Don’t Start a Business Overseas
A few retired Ex-pats give their retirement nest egg away by starting businesses in retire cheap countries. There are a million ways to take your nest egg if you start a business overseas.
Even if you don’t buy the real estate where the business operates, it will be easy to take your money away. You may lease or buy a building and do improvements for a new business you want to start.
The business may be chained up when you get to work someday for some reasons you have never heard of. Some permits they say you forgot to get or the permits you got for the improvements were wrong or not built to local standards.
Or, the landlord you leased the building from has a change of heart and takes the property back from you. You may think you are protected by the lease. But have you read about the court systems in these retire cheap countries? The rule of law is an empty promise in most of the world.
Many ex-pats have been taken to the cleaners for opening businesses. Just keep your retirement life simple overseas. Have a good time. Don’t stick your neck out where it can get chopped off. If you need to do something with all of your energy, help a neighborhood charity or teach English to the neighborhood kids. Or, just ease into your retirement the easy peasy way.
If you insist on starting some kind of business in retirement, start one online that has no direct physical attachments to any overseas destination so you never have anything at risk. If things get weird, you can move to another part of the country or to another country. An information business that exists purely online won’t be lost if you move to greener pastures.
May I suggest that you start an online information business that you can run completely on your computer with no physical connection to any retire cheap country? For more on how to start an online business that lets you freely move around the planet, check my video, What is the best online business for overseas retirees?
Wait Until You are Dead to Give Away Your Retirement Nest Egg
If you really love someone, and they love you, there is a way to leave them your retirement nest egg once you are dead. After you are dead, you won’t need it anymore. You can set it up so that someone that you love is rewarded for the love they gave you until you died.
But if they turn out to be a con artist, you can keep your retirement assets while you are alive. Then you will still have the resources to take care of yourself while you are alive. Most con artists won’t last until you die. Most con artists won’t wait that long. They will fly away for greener pastures usually in the first 3 to 5 years.
And since they flew away in frustration, that means you still have your retirement income and assets when they leave. Then, you might be able to find true love before you die. And you can die knowing that the person that was there for you until the end gets the money. Instead of some con artists that ran off with your money 5 years before you ever got sick.
Talk to an attorney in your home country and explain that you want to set things up so things pass upon your death to whoever you decide, your family and/or your new love. Tell them to set it up so you can change that it easily if someone turns out to be other than they seemed. A good estate planning attorney should be able to help you with this. And set all of this up before you get married.
Explain that you want your assets to be separate from the marriage assets so you are not relying on a prenup to protect you. In many countries, prenups are as worthless as the paper they are written on. But if you find the right lawyer and set up a good estate plan in your home country before you marry, that is probably going to survive even the best con artist.
The point is, you probably worked hard all of your life. So don’t be a Taylor at the end of your life when you are too old and it is too late to create a whole new retirement nest egg.
Thanks for reviewing my content, How to avoid con artist lovers in overseas retirement. While you are here, make sure to grab a free copy of my eBook, How I Fired My Boss and Traveled the World for 15+ Years.
This is Dan of Vagabond Awake, the Youtube Channel for VagabondBuddha.com. The world is your home, what time will you be home for dinner?
