How to leave the US with only Social Security as income

Can you leave the US if your only income is Social Security? Probably. Let’s look at your options.

We’ll give you a typical Social Security check and less than the typical net worth and see what you can do with it.

I’m not a financial advisor. I’m a stranger on the internet who’s just looking at possibilities. You’ll do your own research, of course.

Prices and specific visa rules are from mid-2024. The techniques are timeless.

How much Social Security?

The average Social Security payment in 2025 will be $1966. Let’s say you’ll get less than that.

For our example, you get $1800/month in Social Security. The US will give you a raise each year to account for inflation, so we’ll ignore inflation for now.

How much cash?

According to the Federal Reserve, the median net worth for Americans aged 55-64 is $364,500 (or it was in 2022).

Let’s be more conservative. Let’s say that if you sold your house and car and paid off all debt, you’d have $250,000 and nothing else.

However, let’s not sell your house yet.

Where could you afford to live?

Living on $1800 a month in the US is challenging. In many other places in the world, it’s great.

These sites will help you see how far $1800 can take you (literally!):

• The Earth Awaits lets you choose a budget and lifestyle and then suggests cities to consider
• My Life Elsewhere compares basic statistics like life expectancy, health care, and expenses
• Numbeo lets you compare the detailed cost of living of different cities

You can even afford to live in many places in Europe on $1800/month. For example, The Earth Awaits suggests several European cities when you tell it that you’re willing to live in a one-bedroom apartment outside the city center in a safe city. These include:

• Braga, Portugal
• Zaragoza, Spain (and basically every smaller city in Spain)
• Tallinn, Estonia and many other places in the Baltics
• Krakow, Poland, and most other Polish cities
  

  

• Maribor, Slovenia
• Paphos, Cyprus
• Budapest, Hungary
• Bratislava, Slovakia
• Brno, Czech Republic
• Zagreb, Croatia
• Brasov, Sibiu, and basically any other Romanian city
  

  

• Plovdiv and any other Bulgarian city (see Why I like Bulgaria but you might not)
• Belgrade and everywhere else in Serbia

To this list, I’d add cities in Albania, Montenegro, North Macedonia, Greece, southern Italy, and Turkey.

Some Latin and Asian favorites also appear on the list, including:

• Taipei, Taiwan
• Penang, Malaysia
  

  

• Merida, Mexico
• Hanoi, Vietnam
• Chiang Mai and Bangkok, Thailand
  

  

See my big list of non-trendy locations for many more ideas. Most of them are affordable.

These prices are for long-term living, not tourist rentals

The challenge isn’t finding a place you can afford. It’s convincing the government to let you stay there so you can get these long-term rents. You might be surprised by the residence visas you could get.

Qualifying for a visa with just Social Security

If you rely just on $1800 in Social Security, you could probably go to any country that has a retirement or passive income visa with modest requirements. Most of these will be in:

• Southeast Asia
• Eastern Europe and the Balkans
• Latin America

(New to visas? See How visas work.)

This list of countries with retirement visas shows typical monthly income requirements. Double-check the amounts; some of them aren’t up to date.

Some countries with affordable retirement visas include:

• Panama: A favorite thanks to easy entry and low taxes.
• Portugal: A favorite that’s becoming less popular thanks to increasing housing costs and fewer tax breaks.
• Thailand: You would just squeak by the retirement visa requirements with $1800/month if the site linked above is correct.
• Bulgaria: With $1800, you’d have a comfortable life, even renting a decent apartment in Sofia.
  

  

Two more European destinations are worth looking at using just your Social Security:

• Albania: The requirement appears to be about $875/month. For this you get a southern European lifestyle with Italian flavors and popular beaches.
• Cyprus: You can live on this Mediterranean island with a Category F residence visa, which requires only about $10,400 a year in income.

Some other destinations not mentioned on the linked site:

• Peru: Apparently you can qualify with $1,000/month. Lima has modern neighborhoods with excellent cuisine. For a smaller town, Cusco is popular, but Arequipa looks better to me (fewer tourists).
• Paraguay: You could qualify in this increasingly popular country with our sample $1800/month.
  

  

For most visas, you also need to show some savings. However, the amount of savings required usually tracks with the monthly income – lower income requirements mean lower savings requirements. So depending on how much cash you have and the country you’re trying to impress, you probably don’t need to sell your house.

Benefits of this approach

By relying on just your Social Security to qualify for a visa, you’ve left your $250k untouched.

You could keep your US house, rent it out, and enjoy the extra income.

Or you could sell the house and:

• Invest the proceeds, using the dividends for extra income
• Invest the proceeds and let them grow until you’re old and feeble, and then treat yourself to at-home nursing care or one of those luxury old-age resorts in Thailand
• Use the proceeds to buy an inexpensive home in your new country, so you never have to pay rent or a mortgage again

Qualifying with investments + Social Security

If you sell the house and free up the cash, you have three more options for visas.

1. Impress them with your higher income

Let’s say you’ve done this:

• Sold your house and netted $250k
• Set aside $50k in an interest-bearing account for emergencies
• Invested $200k

This has given you an extra $8,000 or so per year that you can spend. Let’s call this an additional $600 per month, making your monthly total $2400.

If the visa authorities are willing to include your investment income with your Social Security, you can now qualify for more retirement visas. These could include:

• Spain
• France
• Greece
• Malaysia
• Brazil

Your $50k emergency savings will probably satisfy savings requirements.

2. Impress them with your pile of money

Get around income requirements

If you don’t meet the income requirement, the government might accept your pile of money instead.

A country that says that you have to have an income of $X might be happy to ignore that requirement if you show that you have an easily accessible pile of $Y.

Example:

• Mexico: At their new rates, your $1800/month income won’t get you a visa. However, if you can show an account in which about $74,000 has sat untouched for a year, you can qualify.

Get a longer-term visa from the start

Some countries let you get a lower-hassle visa if you show them a pile of money. For example, you could get a visa that’s good for five years instead of a visa that you have to renew every year.

Often, that money needs to be in a bank of that country. You get the money back with a pitiful amount of interest at the end of the visa period.

Example:

• Thailand: If you deposit about $14,000 in an approved Thai bank account, you can qualify for the lowest tier of the Thai Elite visa. This means you don’t have to renew the visa for five years. If you deposit more, you can get a longer-term visa.

For a lot more about using a pile of money to qualify for a visa, see How to Leave the US.

3. Buy real estate to get residency

Your $200k can get you a perfectly livable place in many desirable countries. Buying that place might also get you a visa.

It seems that most “buy a house, get residency” visas make you buy an expensive house. But at least one is easily accessible:

• Serbia: You can get permanent residency from buying inexpensive real estate. If you have about $40k in cash, you can avoid visa renewals and live rent-free on the European continent. (However, real estate in Serbia looks overpriced compared to neighboring Bulgaria, where it’s pretty easy to get a retirement visa.)

What if I just want to travel?

If you don’t want to jump through visa hoops, you could travel slowly, renting short-term apartments in budget-friendly countries. You could stay in each one as long as the tourist visa allows, and then move on.

Your monthly expenses will be higher, because you’ll have to pay higher short-term rents. As a result, those cost of living sites will be less useful.

Your insurance costs will probably also be higher, because health insurance for travelers is usually more expensive and covers less than in-country insurance for residents. Some people travel without insurance, since medical costs in most countries are a fraction of US costs.

While you could travel full time on $1800 a month in budget-friendly countries, you’ll want to have a cushion of cash to land on if necessary. Use your house to create that cushion.

Some examples:

• Rent out your US house for extra income that you funnel into an emergency fund
• Sell the US house, set aside a chunk of the proceeds for emergencies, and invest the rest

Use full-time travel to choose a place to settle

Your experiences traveling will help you decide what’s important to you and what you can live without. It will also open your eyes to how affordable much of the world can be to someone with a USD income.

Here, Allie and Rob describe what they’ve learned during their visits to Bangkok and how that could translate into living there on Social Security.

Photo at top: Chablekal, Yucatan, Mexico