13 countries that hit the sweet spot between cheap housing and good quality of life for US expats
- More Americans than ever are working remotely — it’s led to an uptick in homebuyer migration.
- While some will relocate within the US, others may consider a move to another country entirely.
- There are many countries around the world where expats can live affordably.
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So you’re thinking about moving abroad?
For many Americans, the demise of the daily commute to the office has opened up a whole new world of possibilities about how and where to live.
As more companies transition to the hybrid or remote work model, a study from freelancing platform Upwork, shows that 18.9 million Americans now plan on moving to a new home. The Upwork findings come from a survey of over 23,000 people. According to the company, 28% of respondents say they intend to move more than four hours away from their existing residence.
“From working habits to commuting patterns, there is an undercurrent of change,” Upwork researchers wrote. “This is especially true when we look at the geographical implications of remote work. For the first time, remote work allowed many people across the country to see a life in which the location of their job and where they live did not have to be one and the same.”
While many Americans will relocate to a housing market within the United States, others may consider a move to another country. To determine where American expats can live comfortably, Insider ranked the most affordable housing markets across the globe that can also offer a good quality of life.
To get a sense of potential top countries for Americans to move to, we used house price-to-income ratios data from the International Monetary Fund, the most recent Human Development Index, and an analysis on the average cost of a 2-bedroom flat in the city center from financial site Finder. We looked at the 57 countries excluding the US for which data was available from these three data sources.
After sorting through dozens of countries, we were able to identify the places outside of the US where Americans can live relatively inexpensively and that also have a high standard of living based on the average rank of the three sets of data we used.
If Americans are daring enough to make the miles long journey, Ireland — which tops our list — not only offers them a relatively low cost of living, but also breathtaking views of nature. The same can be said for Peru and countless other countries that round out our top 13 list.
Read on to see where US expats can get the most bang for their buck. Finder’s analysis gave home prices in pounds, but we converted the average cost of a 2-bedroom flat to US dollars at the exchange rate as of August 29 for the 13 countries below.
