I‘m sure it‘ll change in Portugal within the next decade.
Brexit greets:
This might just be a start on what‘s to come
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Had to google that one to know where that is (and I am kind of a map geek)
That’s where it gets complicated. The Swiss pension fund might be taxed differently in different jurisdictions. In some it might be regarded as income, in others it might be regarded as wealth, in Luxembourg it is not directly taxable but leads to a re-calculation of the income tax rate, which is then applied to the income. The only way to find out for sure is to test it with a smaller chunk of money (e.g. pillar 3) or to ask (and pay) someone who knows it.
It is exactly these kind of information that can guide us to find a good place to withdraw the capital. Maybe Ukraine taxes withdrawals very low. To know for sure you would have to find hard evidence.
I agree, PWC and Deloitte are the places to look for such information. However, I looked for Thailand and couldn’t find the info that foreign-earned income is tax-free if imported to Thailand one year later. Crucial for a FIRE expat, wouldn’t you think? I just needed a snapshot in time, so now I can play with my Excel for a year or so before it becomes obsolete. I’m happy to share it, btw.
Agreed, once a shortlist has been selected, you would want to touch base with other expats living there, as I am currently doing with these guys (https://www.isaan-thai.ch/). They discuss tax offices where it is easy to get the paper work done for capital withdrawals and where to get help with it. Don’t forget that a FIRE person might be mobile, so long-term political or economic stability might not be so relevant.
Ha ha ha, yes I did too. And this guy is really crazy but inspiring. Like @Bojack mentioned: 500 people and a quick jog around the island. Might not be for everyone 
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Great info in this thread thanks to dom.swiss. A practical consideration if you are Retiring Early is that you may have kids (my situation) and moving to school in exotic locations far away from grandparents involves other factors than tax …
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Are you waiting for someone to ask?
Unless you want to sell it or it has some personal information in it, I guess it’s no harm to share. No downsides, only potential upsides 
Meh… I get being a nomad, but I think most people like to have a place they call home. And there is also the possibility of being officially a resident of country X, but spending your time a bit here, a bit there. That was actually my idea with Switzerland. If I had Swiss passport, I would pay my taxes here, but could sublet my flat and travel for many months to another country, to lower the cost. But I would always have this reliable, stable country to come back to.
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That’s exactly what I would like.
Take my Fire from a few years from now (maybe 5 … maybe 10) and settle somewhere but travel a lot with my wife. (even stay living in Thailand, Costa Rica, etc. 1-2-3 years…). So it’s finding the balance between taxes / quality of life / stability to call “home”. Either Switzerland, Spain …
Oh my god, his website really got me dreaming. It could be a paradise, a tightly knit community of like-minded people. Or a nightmare where if you do one thing wrong everybody will find out and hate you Plus the constant boat trips to the “big land”. But as a place to just be your “base” from which you travel, it’s for sure interesting. I wonder, however, if you can count on the island’s stability. Channel Islands are in fact dependent on the goodwill of London. As long as they stay under the radar, nobody will care, but what if one day it’s brought to public opinion how a few lucky individuals pay no taxes and enjoy all the protection of the UK, etc…
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I know I would hate the weather. 
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Wheather would also be a problem for me. Does anybody know some similar island, lets say in the adriatic sea? 
Yes, but it didn’t last long 
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Looks like you guys are up for some independent tax havens: 
Bojack, you flagged very legitimate questions. I am planning for FIRE with some of the same questions.
Let me share some thinking first and then some of my plans if it helps for inspiration.
Thinking:
- networking. One takeaway from the nomad guy. Network with wealthy people, some ideas may come up. Through this community or others you may try to expand your network base. Maybe some of your fellow country that can give some ideas.
- fee-only advisors. Even if it would cost few thousand CHF, I see it as helpful to have someone clear up your thoughts and give some suggestions. My father in law has NW of 5-10m and I am recommending this constantly as he has too many questions but not a structured a process. And I don’t to do the work for him as i always think to have mixing up family matters and money.
My plans. I don’t overcalculate but trying to put my head down and save as much as I can while enjoying myself (nice dinners and holidays - some time comprising low cost vs higher cost hols). I hope to reach FIRE in 11 years but I may work longer depending on how financially attractive will be contracts and the stress that goes along.
Ideas:
-
moderate NW. Relocate to Portugal but perhaps still have a small flat in CH in some low taxation canton (Schwyz), in case things change and I need to change my plan
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high NW. buy a flat outside Zürich or lower cost Canton to have a base but travel frequently. I d benefit from low taxation and good healthcare
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significant NW (in case things go much better than expected). Consider renting small flat in Monaco (no tax), plus buying a villa in either aix-en Provence or in the hills behind Cannes. In this way I would benefit from no taxation and good healthcare in Monaco and spend weekend / free time in a bigger space in France, maybe with a swimming pool included
There are so many shades of grey. Need to find the mix that satisfies you. Also as you get older priorities my change, family may matter more so you want to be closer. The other is real estate. Having a base or some investment, even though low yielding provides stability.
I hope this helped!
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Sure, that would be something. But in reality I have 0 close friends. Don’t even know where to find new ones. We live in this age where it’s so hard to build meaningful relationships. This forum is the best substitute I have for that. But even here it seems that most people are at the beginning of their path, or their life view is much different, despite the fact that we’re on a FIRE forum.
I also could never relax during the mustachian meetups. Meet in a pub and talk about what exactly? I like to have a goal, an agenda. And I hate beer
This would have to be solved by word-of-mouth. I would only spend a few thousand chf if a person I trust vouched for it.
Yes I’ve been pondering on buying something in Schwyz (or ZG, UR, NW, OW). One user suggested buying and becoming landlord, and still renting the place you live. Then you have more flexibility.
Regarding relocation to Portugal, personally, I’m skeptical about it, but I will write it in a separate post, stay tuned!
With high NW I’d buy a house at Zürisee. Yeah 3-4 million, but a great view of the lake and mountains, a great city with an airport nearby.
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As I understand it, the flag theory aims to deal with dire scenarii (otherwise, you don’t need the extra complications and could use one-two flags for all your needs). In that case, I’d also network with handy people: they know their stuff, can solve any problem that can be solved with craft and have their own network of locals.
If you own real estate anywhere, I’d also network with the neighbours. They’re the ones who’ll protect your interests on site and I want them on my side.
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Regarding the discussion “which country to live in once retired”, I think it’s very important to consider personal and economic freedoms in that country, and the outlook in the future.
I’ve stumbled upon the Human Freedom Index, which measures exactly that. I find the ranking very interesting and I think the countries that rank high are also the countries which have developed the fastest in recent years (or maintained their development).
On the scale of personal freedom, the Nordic countries top the list with Sweden, Denmark, Norway & Finland, New Zealand and Switzerland close behind.
The economic freedom is highest in Hong Kong, Singapore, New Zealand, Switzerland, Australia, USA, Mauritius and Georgia (to my surprise).
So, mostly there is no surprise, top countries are the usual suspects, where you also pay a high price (in living costs) for the level of freedom that they provide. Then there is the question which direction will these countries go. Spain and Portugal rank high, though mostly thanks to the personal component. I think demographics will put strain on the economic freedom in these countries, as it might happen to most European countries.
Hey @Bojack, lighten up a bit. I am also more towards the end of the path. We can have a conversation, if you like. just one-on-one. Or a virtual meeting with agenda. Small talk can always lead to meaningful conversations, but I understand not everyone was born with the extrovert gene. I just realized I spend far more hours sifting through information about taxes, investing and FIRE than building actual relationships. Maybe I have become an introvert?
How about this agenda
5’ personal introduction by all participants (education, jobs, family, hobbies)
10’ Present own current challenges with FIRE topics
20’ Share experiences (a.k.a. P2P coaching)
5’ Take-away and deciding on the next steps
(This post should probably go into the Café section)
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I didn’t mean to sound soppy. I’m just stating the facts. I wrote it after watching this video. It’s a general problem, people don’t have close friends anymore.
I don’t think it would work either, because it’s too artificial, it would be hard for people to open up. I remember in my first months in CH, I forced myself to join a community in Zurich that organized meetups in pubs and other activities. I would go, a few times I would just leave home after 5 minutes and feel terrible that I came. These were the pub meetings. But I enjoyed the ones where we did something fun. We went once for go karts, laser tag, bowling, played poker. A home party with beer pong and “never have I ever” game was also fun (never played beer pong before, so was catching up for some unexperienced youth). In the end I found a girlfriend like this and then I stopped going 
The comfortable stay-at-home introvert kicked back in.
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a good clip, thank you! It’s good you discovered your distaste of beer only after meeting girlfriend through beer pong 
Or was it because? ha ha, just kidding!
I share a lot of your comments made on this thread, watched the video, but makes me feel less soppy. 
I mean the effect of social media is certainly massive (& effect we will only see in a decade or so) for younger people (millennials), but Generation X, well we know the pre-internet times, and we should remember it wasn’t all a “flowery tribal wonderland”. We romantisice this past, like was romantisiced the Switzerland of the 70ies and 80ies in another thread (low crime, clean streets, but forgetting an in-bred inward-looking mono-culture conservative, judgemental & neurotic society, I’ll just mention Frauenstimmrecht-1971 & the drug scene 1980ies as the highlights. But I digress).
In detail I can only judge by my own family - here goes - in the 70ies and 80ies my parents, at my age now, had zero close friends, I’d say. My mother a bit of those housewife friends/neighbours, who she could probably share some troubles with, but my father none at all.
Good friends of mine where I slept over as a child and had a bit of insight, those parents had few friends IMO, and most of the top friends if there were any were uncle’s & aunt’s.
Do we count our SO to close friends or not? I think we should. What about a sibling, they usually there for you & can understand your problems well. I’d count them too, if that is the case.
I believe it’s people looking back to youth / school times with all those friends & fun-times and comparing to now when older (few friends, maybe moved to a different city, even emigrated to a foreign place). It’s not a fair comparison to make.
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Well, my parents don’t have any friends now, even if I remember that they used to have some in the 90s (work colleagues, but still, they went skiing together, got invited to dinner). And yeah, I go back to the school times, where I saw the same group of people every day. Even if it was not rosy, it was socializing. Then my job in Poland, with many young people. Now I’m just an external “manpower” in a company full of older men with their own families.
Coming back to the topic, networking seems hard to achieve.
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