64: Budgeting: How much do you really need to move abroad?

Moving abroad is a fun adventure, but let’s be honest—it’s not just about packing your bags and hopping on a plane. You do need to consider and map out the financial side of your move abroad as well. In today’s episode, we’re diving into the nitty-gritty of how much you really need to budget for a move abroad.

In this episode, we cover:

• Pre-moving costs like visa fees and health insurance
• Initial Setup Costs like temporary accommodation and housing deposits 
• Ongoing Monthly Costs like including housing and utilities
• Miscellaneous and Emergency Fund

I’m breaking it all down to make sure you’re financially prepared every step of the way. So get ready, because this episode is packed with tips to help you plan your move without breaking the bank. 

Give it a listen!

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Website: jordangiberson.com
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Transcript

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Make sure that you're creating this budget so that there aren't any surprises and you can start saving, for your move and if you need to save a bit then you can do that because then it's all on paper. It's kind of a plan so that you can actually move abroad and make it happen for yourself. Hey, my name is Jordan Giberson. I'm a Texas girl living and thriving in London. The best thing I've ever done? Moving abroad, hands down. And I'm passionate about helping others do the same. Are you curious about finding a job abroad? You're in the right place, friend. I'll teach you the tried and true secrets of how to make moving abroad a reality for you and how to live a fulfilling life once you get there. We'll cover topics like choosing the best visa for you, how to get a job offer in another country, how to get over your fear of moving abroad, and how to live a life you love once you get there, this is The Move Abroad Podcast. Hello, and welcome to another episode of the move abroad podcast. Today, we're going to be talking about budgeting. How much do you really need to move abroad? Moving abroad is such a fun adventure, but let's be honest. It's not just about packing your bags and hopping on a plane. You do need to consider and map out the financial side of your move abroad as well. So in today's episode, we're diving into the nitty gritty of how much you really need to budget for a move abroad from the pre-move costs like flights and visas to setting up your new home and managing monthly expenses. I'm bringing it all down to make sure you're financially prepared every step of the way. So get ready because this episode is packed with tips to help you move. So get ready because this episode is packed with tips to help you plan your move without breaking the bank. Let's go ahead and get started. So in this episode, we're going to cover your pre moving costs. The initial setup costs and then ongoing monthly costs and your miscellaneous costs and emergency fund. So I'll share some costs in U.S dollars and some in euros, but at the time of this recording, 1 U.S dollar is equal to about 98 cents in euros or 1 Euro is equal to about 1 dollar and 2 cents. So they're pretty much one for one is the point of, of what I'm trying to say. So keep that in mind, as you're listening to this episode. So the 1st section we're going to cover is the pre moving costs. So some of the costs that you need to be aware of is the visa fee. So costs will really depend on the country and the visa that you get. You know, whether it's a work visa, a student visa, or a freelance visa, I mean, the list would go on depending on the visa that you need. So some examples might be Portugal's D7 Visa which is quite popular visa to get that's about 50 to 300 euros, which again is pretty equivalent to the cost in U.S dollars as well. And then Spain's non lucrative visa. As another example, that's$152. The Croatia digital nomad visa is 60 euros. That's about$65. The Germany, freelancer visa is 60 euros to 140 which again, it's close to that. It's going to be about 65 to$150. So if you're planning to get a job abroad, normally the company will sponsor you, which means that they will cover the cost. So you won't be responsible for paying for the visa costs. If you are getting a job abroad, the company will pay for you there, you know, paying you to work there, they'll pay for your visa. So you won't have to worry about covering the cost of that visa, if that's you, but for a visa where you're covering yourself, as in your starting a business, your working as a freelancer, something like that, then you will need to pay for your visa. But honestly, the visa costs aren't crazy high. I mean, you know, 50, 150. Was about what we talked about and, the visa fees. So that's, it's not a crazy high amount, but just something to be aware of for the visa fees, and the costs that it will be for the country and visa type that you will have. So basically in order to find out the cost that you specifically will need, honestly, if you just Google, you know, Portugal's D7 visa costs. It'll pop up the cost that you'll need to save so that you can budget for that amount. But whatever visa you need, just Google that cost and it'll come right up. The 2nd pre moving costs that you need to be aware of is a potential cost for an immigration. You know, legal support of some kind. So not everyone will need an immigration, lawyer or consultant, but hiring an immigration lawyer consultant can cost anywhere from 500 to$3,000 or more, depending on how many hours you're working with them and how complicated your situation is. If you know, you will have some sort of complicated situation or you're just happy to pay for the lawyer fees that somebody else can take care of the application for you then feel free to hire an immigration lawyer, but immigration lawyers can be pretty expensive and I've heard of 2 different immigration lawyers messing up a visa application for a couple people that I know. So just something to keep in mind, whenever you're hiring an immigration lawyer is just making sure that they have really good reviews. but it's someone that you can trust most of the time you can appeal your visa application if it was denied for some reason. So, as long as you've checked that you qualify for the visa, then you should be able to get it. There shouldn't be any issues. It's really just filling out paperwork, but they might just come back and deny it. Quote unquote, because they might just need more information or something wasn't very clear in her application. But I will say nobody will care more about your visa application than you. I have filled out so many visa applications and most of the time it's pretty straight forward. I remember my last piece that I applied for my lawyer, which I am working for a company. So my company that I work for sponsor my visa, which means that they pay for my visa and they also pay for the lawyer. Most companies, whenever they sponsor you, they will hire a lawyer or a company that will go through the visa process and, you know, make sure that everything is squared away. But again, you can do it yourself. I filled out multiple visa applications all my own, and we'll touch more on that in a second. But basically if I feel like the application is pretty straightforward, my lawyer had me fill out a form, quote, unquote. That was literally the visa application form. Most immigration lawyers will do a console. So basically I was filling out the application for my visa and my lawyer was just copying and pasting my answers and slotting it into the application, which feels kind of silly to pay a lawyer to do that. I feel like that's pretty unnecessary. Again, it depends if you're happy to pay for the fee and you just want someone else to take care of it for you, that's totally fine. But my recommendation would be to first of all figure out which visa you need. You know, you have to know where you're moving to and which visa you're going to get the specific one. And then from there, I would actually just go online and just get an understanding of what the visa application consists of, so you want to, first of all, make sure that you qualify for the visa. So some visas will require that you have a certain amount of income, for example. So, you know, if you're a freelancer, they want to make sure that you're not just going to move there and become homeless. So they want to make sure that you're going to be able to support yourself. So you have to prove that you make you know, it's different for different countries, but let's just say it's 1500 U.S dollars per month. That they want to make sure that you cover. So you'll have to prove that in your application process. So you will have to just know that you, basically qualify for all the lists of qualifications and the lists that out, like exactly what you need to qualify for whenever you're applying for a visa. But what I would recommend is just start filling out the visa application so that whenever you come to a question they're asking you and you're like, I have no idea what they're even talking about then. You can list out those specific questions to Google on your own, or most immigration lawyers will do a consultation call with you before you need to pay anything. So if I were you, I would figure out all the questions that you had first, write them all down the specific questions, and then hop on a free consultation call with one lawyer or multiple lawyers. If you weren't able to get all your questions answered from the first lawyer or something wasn't clear, or you just want to get a second opinion. Then, you know, answer, get all those questions answered with the lawyer. And then if you want to hire them, because it's still unclear or you feel like you might have a more complicated situation than some other people. Then hire an immigration lawyer at that point, then it's worth it to pay that 500 or even after 3000 U.S dollars. If that's the case. But that would be my recommendation instead of just hiring an immigration lawyer from the get-go, unless you have the money to do it. And you know, you have, you know, multiple family members and it's just a bit easier. You don't have the time to deal with it. You just don't want the stress of it. That's totally fine. And definitely, you know, feel free to hire that legal support, but you know, if you're so low and you have a really simple, you know, you're just not just a freelancer. So if you're on the circumstance where you are a freelancer and your application is going to be really straightforward, you know, that you qualify for each thing exactly. And it's a really easy application. If it's a freelancer or, you know, you are going to be a digital nomad, those applications tend to be pretty straightforward. So I don't think in those cases you would need an immigration lawyer. So anyways, that's my spiel on immigration support, but definitely factor in that cost. And your budget and how much you think that you'll need to be able to move abroad. The 3rd, of pre moving cost you'll want to look at is the document preparation. So let's say that you might need to renew your passport and that might be$130 or so let's say that you need to get something notarized as you're filling out your application and going through the process that might be$20 or$50 per document. So those are some of the things that you might run into. So just be prepared for some of those potential costs that might come around. The 4th costs for pre moving costs is the health insurance. So I'll be before you arrive, some visa applications require you to have proof of private health insurance before you arrive. A lot of those visas where you are basically sponsoring yourself, if you're a freelancer at digital nomad, if you're a student, so a lot of those visas will require that you pay for private health insurance so that you're not using the country's public health system. So for this, I would budget 50 to$200 per month. It depends on the country that you're moving to, but a lot of times it will fall within the range of 50 to 200 per month for health insurance. And this is again, if you're basically sponsoring yourself, taking care of yourself, if you are going to be working for a company, a lot of times this will be taken care of for you. The 5th pre moving costs you'll need to pay for is a one-way flight. So that'll typically range from 300 to 1200. I know it's a big range, but it really depends on the time of the year and the destination that you're going to. So just make sure that you budget. You can go ahead and look up flights. If you go to the Google flights and start researching how much the flight cost is for when you're wanting to move, you can start to figure out what that range will look like four flights and another little pro tip. As you're looking for flights, you can look on websites like Skyscanner. If you want to try to find cheaper flights, I love searching on Google flights and make sure to put your search in incognito. Or you can also use a VPN so that if you're looking for flights every single day, those flights don't start to increase like crazy. So make sure you're using incognito mode or a VPN of some sort so that you are not being tracked and have your flight increased by a crazy amount, but I would definitely go and see how much you think that is as you're starting to look into your expenses and how much it needs a budget. The 6th pre moving costs I think about is shipping costs. So you might want to ship some of your belongings. This really depends on if you're thinking, oh, I'm going to buy all my furniture once I'm there, or I'm moving into a place that's already pre furnished, or I am moving all my furniture. I mean, it will really depend on the volume and the distance where you're moving to. So that could be somewhere from 500 to 5,000 U.S dollars. And it also really depends on how you ship it. So if you do a ship, so sometimes you can put your things, like through a cargo ship. So it'll take a few weeks to get there, but it won't cost you nearly as much as if you do, transfer via air. So if it's, you know, on an airplane and it gets to you within a few days, instead of a few weeks, that's going to cost a lot more. So if you're just, you know, thinking I want to go really light, I'm just going to bring a couple, 2 to 3 suitcases and just start fresh, then that'll just be a 100 to 300, you know, per additional suitcase on your flights that you're moving with. Or if you're thinking you want to ship your belongings a few weeks in advance using a ship, you doing freight, then that won't cost as much. But if you're wanting to ship all of your furniture and belongings via air or something like that. That's going to be a lot more. So this is ranging by a very large amount, but it does really depend on how you're wanting to ship it. So just think about, you know, What you're willing to do. If you want to ship it more in advance and do the ship where it's less expensive and you're shipping a lot of belongings still, you'll just kind of have to look into the different costs and what's worth it to you for when you're wanting to move. So shipping costs would be something that I would consider for your pre moving costs. And then pre moving costs 7 to consider is storage. So this would be the storage in the U.S or wherever you're from. So you might want to store some of your belongings state side. It really depends again, on how much you're wanting to store. So you might want to budget 50 to 300 a month for a storage unit. Obviously a storage unit closer into the city is going to be more expensive. A storage unit further out of the city in the middle of nowhere is going to be less expensive and obviously a smaller storage unit. If you have less stuff is going to be cheaper than a really big storage unit or multiple storage units. If you're going to do that. So factor in that cost and started doing some research on the storage units in your area to figure out how much you need to budget monthly for a storage unit. And the 8th and final pre moving costs that I would consider. Is the pre-move travel. So another pre moving cost that you might want to consider is doing a sneaky test drive or trip to visit your destination, to figure out neighborhoods that you want to live in, to kind of get a feel for the area. So, if you want to do a research trip and visit potential destinations or the one placing, you know, you wants to move to, but to check out different neighborhoods and to look at houses and secure, you know, a place to rent, if you want to view it in person, or house to purchase, if you want to do that, which I would recommend you rent first, but that is totally your decision. Then that can add, you know, another 1000 to 3000 or more to your budget. So just consider that as you're thinking about your move abroad and whether you want to factor in that cost and whether it'd be worth it to you to do this research trip before you actually moved there. So make sure it's a factor that into your pre moving costs. So those were some of our pre moving costs. I think that you should consider before you move abroad. Now let's dive into some of the initial setup costs. So this is whenever you're first moving abroad and just kind of starting to start settling in and kind of setting up. And kind of setting up your life there. So one thing that you want to consider is temporary accommodation if you decide to do that, pre-move travel. That trip that we just talked about, then maybe you'll be able to secure some accommodation then and know exactly where you're moving to the specific, you know, apartment or house that you're moving to. But you might also want to consider doing a short term Airbnb or something similar while you're looking for a longterm home. So you might want to budget 1000 to 3000. It could even be more depending on the city, but you'll want to look on Airbnb or similar websites to figure out, you know, how much that will cost. And it will also depend on the location and your preferences. You know, if you want something, that's just a bedroom in someone's house and you're going so low and you're just going to rough it for a little bit that's fine. Or if you're wanting something that's a bit more luxurious and nice, and if you need multiple bedrooms, if you're moving with a family, that'll be something to consider as well. So just kind of figuring out what that cost will be. You can have a quick look on Airbnb or similar websites to figure out what that cost would be. So I would do one months rent or, you know, short-term rental of some sort and go from there. I have had people who have moved abroad and they did a virtual viewing and didn't actually see the, apartment. And then they moved in and it was a horror story. It was a terrible location. It was really dark, there was nasty furniture. It had a weird smell and they were very unhappy moving into the place that they moved into. So I don't say that to scare you, but I say that to just be aware that if you decide to just, you know, move in somewhere and just do a virtual tour, I would just be careful about that because you might, you know, hit gold and it might be amazing and great, but you have to remember that an agency is just trying to rent the place out if you're doing it through an agency, or if it's a landlord that's showing you the place, the location. So I would just be really careful about doing that. As I was looking for flats recently, Some of the photos were honestly horrendous, but then I went to see an in person and it actually had been improved so much since then. It actually was so nice. But then other locations, the pictures looked amazing, but then whenever I saw it in real life, it was absolutely terrible. So I would just be really careful about securing a location abroad without actually seeing it. So I would recommend instead to do a pre-move trip to try to secure accommodation within, you know, A 2 week, 3 week span of time or something like that. She has a cure a place before you moved there or to do this first month rent or short-term Avery, Airbnb. It's not ideal. I know you want to just move into wherever you're going and start settling in. It's where it will start to feel like home, but you'll just have to weigh up the risks and what's worth it to you. So you might want to budget for this temporary accommodation. The 2nd initial setup costs that I would consider is the housing deposit. So depending on the country, typically they'll ask for one to three months rent upfront. So something to be aware of whenever you're thinking about a deposit and saving for that or budgeting for that. So one example is that, you know, if the rent is 1200 a month, then the deposit might be 1200 to 3,600. So think about that whenever you're thinking about the budget for the initial setup costs. The 3rd thing to consider with the initial set of costs is the furniture and household items. You might be moving somewhere that is furnished. You might be moving somewhere that's unfurnished, but if it is unfurnished, you'll want to be thinking about furnishing your apartment. This will really depend on how nice you want your stuff to be. If you're going to Ikea and just doing low budget, then you could be spending a thousand. I mean, you could easily be spending 5,000 to furnish an apartment, or more depending on how many bedrooms you're moving into. So I would just start thinking about how bougie you are and how much you want to be spending on your furnishings. But I would make sure to budget for that cost as well. My flat was furnished whenever I first moved to London and I was sharing a flat. So all I needed to purchase was stuff for my bedroom items, because it already came with a bed and a mattress. So I actually got away with only spending 250 pounds total. I just kind of thought about the cost that I needed for the bedding and the pillows and a little rug for my room and just different things, because I wasn't purchasing things for a whole apartment at the time, but now that I'm moving into an apartment, I'm needing to budget a lot more, to furnish the apartment. So just make sure that you're thinking about the costs and how many bedrooms and what you'll really need for all those kitchen items. And, you know, whether it's partially furnished or completely unfurnished and kind of thinking about all those items you need and start adding that to your budget for the initial setup costs. The 3rd initial set of costs you want to think about is utility setup. So this will depend on where you're moving to, but you might need to budget for deposits or installation fees for some of your utilities. So you might just want to budget a small amount of like a 100 to$300 to be able to set up the utilities. The 5th initial setup costs that you might want to consider is the transportation costs. So you might want to consider purchasing the public transit passes of some sort. So this could be 30 to a hundred euros per month, depending on how much you'll be walking to places, how big, the places that you're moving to, as in the city, and how expensive the city is. So more expensive cities like London and Paris might be a bit more expensive than other cities that are in Europe. You might want to also consider buying a car. This might not be necessary, especially in Europe, as public transportation is so amazing. But if it's necessary. And especially if you have kids, you might want to consider getting a car. So you might want to consider budgeting 5,000 to 20,000. For the cost of the car and registration and insurance costs per month. So you'll want to make sure that you're considering all those costs. Whenever you're thinking about transportation. And the 6th set up costs. Whenever you're moving abroad is to set up a cell phone plan. You want to make sure that you set up a local SIM. And a plan for that. So this could be anywhere from 20 to$50 a month. It's a lot cheaper in Europe than it is in the U.S. I pay 15 pounds per month, and honestly I have data for days. I do not need as much as I have. I honestly could probably be paying probably$10 a month and be totally fine. So you won't be paying nearly as much as you would be in the U.S, but I would definitely budget 20 to$50 per month whenever you're moving abroad. So that was also another set of costs you want to consider. So far we've covered the pre-move costs and then we've covered the initial setup costs, but we'll also need to be thinking about budgeting for our ongoing monthly costs. So the first monthly cost that you'll need to be thinking about budgeting for is your rent. This will obviously really depend on the city and housing type you're looking for. If you're wanting something really, really nice and very spacious and right in the city, that's obviously going to be a lot more expensive than if you're on the outskirts of the city. It's a smaller, you know, apartment and it's in a lower cost city. So it will really depend on where you're going to, so you can do a quick search to figure out how much rent you will need to be paying. But some examples for a one bedroom would be Lisbon. Here's some examples of a one bedroom in Lisbon, Berlin, and Paris. And Lisbon, the cost of a one bedroom will be anywhere from 1000 to 1500 a month and Berlin, and might be 800 to 1200 per month. And in Paris it might be 1200 to 2000 per month. So it really depends on where you're at, but just to get a quick feeler for how expensive a one bedroom apartment might be, and those locations in Europe, then, those were the costs. So, just do a little bit of research. You can just Google online, you know, apartments that are available right now and kind of get a look and a feel for where you want to be and how much they're running for at this time, so that you can get a feel for how much you'd be paying and how much you need to budget for rent per month. Another ongoing monthly costs you'll need to consider as the utilities. So if this is not included in rent, which sometimes it might be, but you'll need to consider the cost for electricity, your water, gas, internet, and local taxes. Some places will require you to pay local taxes. So, these costs for utilities are normally going to be about 150 to 300 per month. But again, it will increase from there. If you have, you know, a big house with multiple bedrooms and, you know, it'll cost a lot more to heat it up and things like that. But, for one bedroom I would expect, you know, 150 to 300 per month. The 3rd ongoing monthly cost would be for health insurance. So you might need to pay for private insurance. You know, this might be something that you covered already that you just need to consider monthly. As we talked about, sometimes for visas, it requires you to pay for private health insurance. Or for health insurance, whenever you get there. So, as we talked about before, if you have a visa that requires you to have proof of health insurance, before you get your visa, then you might already have this, but if you're moving somewhere, you know, in Europe there as public healthcare and countries, but you might want to consider getting some private health insurance just to have some extra coverage, be able to get to doctors quickly. It's not a requirement for most places. I do think that the public health care is so good in Europe, but if you do want to pay for this, then you can consider paying an extra 50 to$200 per month for private health insurance. If you want to, if you get insurance through work. So if you are employed, You will probably have public health care contributions that might be deducted from your salary. So if you'll be employed and you'll be having a salary, you can actually Google, what will my take home pay be in Berlin, Germany, for example, for 60,000 euros, annual salary, for example, and it should tell you exactly how much your paycheck will be for the healthcare contributions included in the calculation. So if you want to find out how much you'll be paying for, you know, that private health care for public health care from your salary, you can actually figure that out for exactly where, where you're moving to and what your salary will be. So, you can do that quick Google, if you'd like to figure out, you know, how much that will be costing you. So that was the 3rd cost for a monthly outgoing costs. The 4th ongoing monthly cost to consider is, you know, groceries and dining. This also really depends on your lifestyle, what you're used to in terms of how many times you like to go out per month. So you might want to consider a 10 to 30 euros per meal that you go out, you know, during that month. And then groceries might be anywhere from 100 to 200 per month per person. And then for the last few ongoing monthly costs, you want to consider transportation. So if you're doing public transit, that will be 30 to a hundred dollars per month that you'll need to budget for. And then for fuel and parking. And, if you're driving, then that'll be maybe a hundred to 200 per month. So you'll want to look into what car you're getting and what the fuel cost is there and kind of budget for what that monthly expense is going to look like. And the 6th ongoing monthly costs, I would consider it just for entertainment and travel. So when a budget for socializing, exploring maybe doing fun weekend trips to other European countries, which would be so exciting. And it's probably one of the reasons why you're so excited to move to Europe. At least it was for me. So you might want to budget maybe a hundred to 500 euros per month. It could be a lot more depending on the lifestyle that you are used to and want to live there. So you might want to consider, you know, how much are you suspending now on your entertainment and travel and consider adding that to your budget for whenever you move to Europe and what that, you know, entertainment and travel budget will look like for you. So that was our pre moving costs. Our initial setup cost. Once you finally moved to Europe and then your ongoing monthly costs that you'll want to budget for. So you can start to figure out, you know, how much money you'll need to be saving or being able to spend, but something to consider as well is the miscellaneous and emergency fund. So some of the things you'll want to be thinking about is banking. So one thing you want to think about is setting up your local account. It might have some fees. It might be like 50 euros or something. I had friends that lived in London who actually never got a local bank account. They were here for only 6 months. So it wasn't a crazy long period of time. But if you don't make a bank account, you will run into some annoyances along the way. So I would definitely get one set up. So just consider about 50 euros potentially to set up the bank. It might not cost you anything, but just to consider, there might be some fees for sending it up or something like that. And you might also want to budget for any currency conversion fees if you're using a U.S card. So I have a U.S credit card with no foreign transaction fee. And I also have a second U.S credit card that does have a foreign transaction fee. So for every, you know, If I spend a dollar or however much I spend, it will charge me, I think, 2% or 2.5% on top of that as a foreign transaction fee. So it's not a big deal if you're spending a small amount, but you know, it does rack up over time. So I have two U.S cards, one with a foreign transaction fee, one without a foreign transaction fee, which I obviously use that card a lot more. And then I also have a UK credit card. And then I also have a U.S debit card and a UK debit card too. So you'll just want to consider the foreign transaction fee, to make sure that you do have a credit card that doesn't have that foreign transaction fee, so that if you want to use your U.S credit card to keep up your credit, which I highly recommend that you do. That won't be you know, You won't have the crazy fees. Also, there will be a small fee whenever you send money internationally, whenever you're first moving abroad, you might want to send, you know, a few thousand dollars to set up your life initially. I would definitely recommend using wise to send money internationally. That's the website and the app that I use. I have wise apple, my phone. I use it literally every single month to send money back and forth between the U.S and the UK. I definitely think that they're the cheapest with their fees and it's always a really smooth and easy process to send money to, or from the U.S, from the country that you're moving to. So I would definitely set that up. I think it's a really great tool to be able to send your money back and forth between the U.S and the country that you're moving to abroad. So those are the costs that I would consider for banking. I will have a link in the podcast description for wise. If you want to check out the link for wise the 2nd thing that I would consider here is your emergency fund. You'll want to make sure that you have 3 to 6 months worth of living expenses for unexpected costs, especially whenever you're first moving somewhere in case there are any surprises of any kind you'll want to make sure that you have funds, you know, on hand so that you can cover any of those expenses that might come your way, especially as you're just getting the hang of things. I think it's just safe to always have 3 to 6 months worth of living expenses on hand at all times, I make sure to have that amount, saved in my you know, savings accounts that I can pull it out at any time, because there are unexpected costs just in life in general, whether you're moving abroad or not. Sometimes just things come up in life and it is good to have that money on hand, just as you know, it's just peace of mind to know that you have it in case you need it. And obviously, you know, if you have more family members that you're moving with to have more expenses to cover costs for them, or for big things that come up. So I wouldn't say that there's going to be some huge, crazy costs. That's, you know, gonna come up from moving abroad that you won't be expecting other than the list that we've been talking about now. But as we know in life in general, you know, things just come up. So I would make sure to have that emergency fund that is your 3 to 6 months worth of living expenses so that you can cover those unexpected costs that might potentially come your way. The 3rd thing in this category that I be considering is taxes. So U.S citizens need to file their annual U.S taxes, even if they're abroad and they might owe foreign taxes. If you have a really simple tax situation, you know, you're just moving abroad to, you know, work at a job. And, you know, you're making less than a hundred thousand dollars per year or something like that. Then this is not something that you need to be worrying about. I will say the U.S has a tax treaty with pretty much every European country. So you shouldn't actually be double taxed, but as a U.S citizen, you have to file your U.S taxes every single year, no matter what, as long as you are U.S citizen, even if you're not living there, which is really annoying. But it is just a bit of paperwork. It shouldn't be too complicated, but if you know, you have a more complicated tax situation, you probably already have a tax lawyer or accountant in the U.S anyways. So let's say that you have, you know, three different properties that you own and you lease out, or you have some other tax situation that's a bit more complicated or you know, own a business, then, you might already have an accountant. But just something to consider, you know, you'll also want to be saving money for your U.S taxes. So you'll want to look into, if you will only taxes, but if you have a really simple tax situation, and if you're making less than$120,000 per year, you shouldn't have to worry about it. So, you want to look into that and just consider that for some of your costs throughout the year, but it shouldn't be too much. Like I said, if you have a simple tax situation and if you're making less than 120,000 per year, but once you make more than that, and it might be worth hiring an accountant to help you work out your tax situation and see if you will owe any taxes in the U.S. So, if you do want to budget for hiring a tax advisor of some sort, you might want to budget 300 to a thousand dollars, and you'll obviously be paying more if you have more of a complex tax situation. But again, if you already have a company in the U.S or multiple properties, or something like that. That might be something that you're already paying, but just make sure that you are accounting for that in your budgeting is for taxes. And the 4th thing that I would consider in our miscellaneous and emergency fund buckets is potentially doing language classes. So this might not be necessary for you. It might not be something that you want to consider, but you might want to budget a hundred to 300 per month for the initial cost for courses. So I would recommend doing this if you don't really speak the language. Well, if that is a goal of yours to speak the language, I also think it's a really great opportunity to meet other ex-pats other people who have moved abroad. Like you I think it's a great way to be able to make friends and be able to learn the language, because if you're planning on living somewhere longer than, you know, 6 months to a year, I think that it is really important to fully integrate into the culture and, you know, feel like you're really a part of it. You need to learn the language. I think you can get by for a little while without knowing the language. But at the end of the day, if you went to fully integrate into the culture and the country, the location that you're moving to, I think that language classes, or if you're not doing classes some other way where you're, you know, totally immersing yourself and learning the language I think would be really, really important. So there you have it. So those were our main categories that I want you to think about whenever you're thinking about your budget to move abroad. So we talked about the pre moving costs, which included the visa fees. Immigration legal support. If you want that, any document preparation, health insurance, if you need that, your flights costs the shipping costs. If you need this, these storage costs in the U.S if you want to store some of your things and your pre move travel, like your research trip, if you decide to do a trip abroad to where you're moving to before you actually moved there. So those were some of our pre moving costs I would consider. And then the initial set up costs. So once you get there, the temporary accommodation, the housing deposits. The furniture and household items, The utility setups, transportation and cellphone plan. Those were the initial set up costs and then our ongoing monthly costs. So that would include rent, utilities, health, insurance, groceries, and dining, transportation, and entertainment and travel. And then we have our last category, which is our miscellaneous and emergency fund. So you might want to consider banking. So figuring out if you're sending money back and forth to budget for the currency conversion fees, to also set up your emergency fund of 3 to 6 months worth of living expenses for those unexpected costs and for taxes and language classes, if you decide to do that. So those were our main categories. Just a quick, you know, sample budgets for you would be the category for pre moving costs. You might want to estimate a cost of 2000 to$10,000 for the initial setup costs. You might want to consider 3000 to$8,000 for, you know, your monthly living expenses that might be 1500 to$4,000. And then lastly, emergency funds for 3 months, that might be 4,500 to 12,000 U.S dollars per month. That you might want to estimate. So if you're thinking about the total costs, you know, you might want to calculate that. And again, you know, if you're used to living a more boozier life, and if you're moving with a family, then you might need to increase the costs. So you want to consider your current lifestyle and whether you're moving with multiple family members to help figure out your estimated costs. But I think starting to budget for how much you think you'll need to be spending. We'll give you a bit of a peace of mind as you're moving abroad and thinking about the cost and just making sure that, you know, you have all your bases covered and there aren't any big surprises after you move abroad. But I also think that's why it's really important to have that emergency fund so that if there are any surprises you're covered. But I do think that the cost that we talked about now should be about right, for the things that you need to consider. Whenever you're thinking about budgeting, but some tips just to avoid any surprises, 1, I would just research the cost of living in your destination. You can use a tool like Numbeo, that's N U M B E O. Numbeo or new MBO. So I would research the cost of living for where you're moving to, because that will help you adjust your numbers to figure out, you know, how much it actually costs for groceries, because that will depend on how much the rent is for where you're moving to for a one bedroom, because that will differ depending on the location that you're moving to. So research the cost of living in your destination, using a tool like Numbeo would be helpful. Number 2 would be, you could join a local ex-pat forum or group to ask for advice on any hidden costs. So you can just search through like a Facebook group, for example, whether it's, you know, might be families in Spain or, women in, Portugal or something like that. And people will probably already be talking about a lot of these things, but you could also reach out to people or, you know, do a post and ask people for any hidden costs to get any insights from that. But also Google is really helpful as well, you know, to figure out any costs you could probably even download a budget, online if you wanted to. So you could always do that to help to start figuring out your budget. The 3rd tip to avoid any surprises. Whenever you're budgeting is to factor in the currency exchange rate and fluctuations, you know, you'll want to look at U.S dollars if you're sending them over and if you're making your money in U.S dollars, if you're a freelancer, for example, you'll want to look at the comparison with the currency exchange rates, just to make sure that if there are huge fluctuations or if it's changed a lot in the past few years, just making sure that you're covering yourself. If you know, the U.S dollar is really powerful, but five years ago it wasn't. You want to make sure that if it does increase again, you're just kind of considering that whenever we're thinking about budgeting. And the 4th tip to avoid any surprises is just double checking the visa requirements for proof of sufficient funds. Like I said, for a lot of visas, you will have to provide proof of sufficient funds. This might be, you know, 1200,$1,500 per month or something like that. It depends on the cost for the visa requirements. You'll want to look at the specific visa that you need and it'll be in the visa requirements, the exact amount that you'll need, but just make sure that you have those funds. As you're thinking about budgeting. Do you want to make sure you have proof of those of the money in coming or, you know, bank statements proving you have those funds. So I would just double-check those visa requirements to make sure that you do cover that amount. So those are some tips that I would, you know, consider to avoid any surprises. But yeah, I think that should be it for just considering the budgets for your move abroad. I know it's not the most fun thing whenever you're thinking about moving. It's not the sexiest thing ever whenever you're thinking about moving abroad, but it is something really important to consider and map out that financial side of your move abroad as well, because it is important to make sure that you are setting yourself up for success so that you're considering all these pre moving costs and then getting all those, you know, things set up for the initial setup costs and then those ongoing costs. So I think it will be helpful to budget and, you know, actually write it all down in a budget in Excel or on Google sheets or wherever you want to save it so that you can kind of figure out, you know, how much, you know, your income is and how much you want to be spending per month. And just making sure that there are no surprises. So I would definitely recommend, you know, creating a budget to kind of figure out if you're not quite there on your budget to make sure that you're saving for your move abroad so that there aren't any surprises and you can make it happen, you know? I would definitely make sure that you're creating this budget so that there aren't any surprises and you can start saving, you know, for your move and just to make sure that there aren't any surprises. And if you need to save a bit before you move abroad, then you can do that because then it's all on paper. And once you budget, it's kind of a plan so that you can actually move abroad and make it happen for yourself. So that is it for me for today's episode. Thank you so much for listening to another episode of the move abroad podcast. I am so appreciative that you're here. I'm so happy that you're here and so thankful for you. And I hope this was helpful. So, thank you again for listening to another episode of the move abroad podcast. I will catch you here again next week. Same time, same place. I'll catch you then.