International Property Advice

Buying property abroad as an American is straightforward, and US law places no restriction on it. What matters is the destination country: whether foreigners can own outright, how the purchase has to be structured, and how you pay. Most US banks do not lend against property overseas, so American buyers typically pay cash or release equity from a home in the US. The purchase itself is not an IRS reporting...

Moving abroad from the US is easier than most Americans expect, and in a few countries buying a home can help you stay. A completed freehold condo in Thailand worth at least THB 3 million, about USD 89,000, supports a renewable stay for as long as you own it. Cyprus offers lifetime permanent residency for a EUR 300,000 new build. Cambodia offers a retirement visa from age 55, with our first properties...

Cambodia is joining our portfolio, with property in Phnom Penh and Siem Reap expected before the end of the year, and it brings something few markets in our range can offer. Own the right property here and you are not just buying an apartment, you are opening the door to a second home in Southeast Asia. Cambodia runs a renewable long stay visa tied to a qualifying investment, a straightforward retirement...

Cambodia is the next market joining our portfolio, and I expect to have properties in Phnom Penh and Siem Reap before the end of the year. It is worth knowing about now rather than when the listings appear, because it does several things that no other market in our range does at the same time. Foreign buyers own condominiums outright in their own name. The whole economy runs on US dollars, so there is no...

You can buy a condo in Bangkok as a foreigner, own it outright with your name on the title deed, and use it as your way to live in Thailand. That combination is rare anywhere in Southeast Asia. Our current Bangkok range starts from about USD 92,000 for a fully furnished one bedroom apartment in Rama 9, which is priced right around three million baht. That figure matters, because a completed freehold condo...

Paphos or Limassol is the first real decision anyone buying in Cyprus has to make, and the honest answer has less to do with lifestyle than most articles suggest. It comes down to budget, and the gap is wider than people expect. Across our current Cyprus listings, the most expensive Paphos property is 420,000 euros. The least expensive Limassol property is 427,000 euros. There is no overlap at all. That...

Most agencies want as many listings as they can carry. I take four properties a month across the Gold Coast and Brisbane, and that number is the whole point. A boutique real estate agent with four properties can give each one a genuinely controlled campaign. An agent carrying forty cannot, however good they are. The same thinking runs through everything else I do. You deal with me at every viewing, every...

Before you ask what your budget buys, it is worth asking why you are buying at all. An investor chasing yield, a family wanting a holiday base, someone building toward residency and someone planning to retire are four different buyers, and they should be looking at three very different markets. Across Bali, Phuket and Bangkok, the same money buys wildly different things. Bangkok is the most affordable of...

Bali or Phuket is one of the most common questions I get from buyers looking at Southeast Asia, and there is a genuine answer rather than a diplomatic one. The single biggest difference is ownership. In Phuket, a foreign buyer can own a condominium unit outright, freehold, registered in their own name. In Bali, no foreigner can hold freehold title to anything, so every purchase runs through a lease or a...

You can buy a villa in the Maldives as a foreign national, and plenty of international owners do. What you cannot do is own the land beneath it. The Maldivian Constitution reserves land ownership for the state, so every foreign purchase is structured as a long term leasehold rather than freehold. For resort villas, that typically means an initial 50 year lease with an option to extend, with total occupancy...