Living in Portugal as an American is ANYTHING but easy.

in this video I want to talk about the things that many YouTubers and bloggers fail to mention when they paint Portugal as this perfect place where all of your troubles melt away and everything is perfect as of recent we're starting to see quite a few YouTube videos and blogs about Portugal not working out for Americans that arrived with high expectations apparently the incredible beaches age-old castles and pastel the NATA wasn't enough to keep these Americans happy in Portugal is it that the culture in Portugal is too different for Americans to comfortably settle into well today we will explore some of the main reasons why so many Americans end up leaving Portugal but first let's find out the big question you've all been waiting for could Dave in Portugal actually be Portuguese I recently did a DNA Heritage test from my Heritage and here's how it went this is the Box myheritage sends you it's super simple you just swab your cheek with some saliva and send it off and wait for your results so I just received the results from myheritage let's see what ethnicity I am Dave are you ready to explore your ethnicity let's go I'm a little bit nervous Dave you are 51 Irish Scottish and Welsh this I pretty much already knew 22 Scandinavian I did not know that that's crazy I definitely didn't get the height for that one thirteen point one percent Iberian I might be Portuguese oh my gosh 8.4 Italian I thought I was more Italian interesting and five percent Baltic Dave in Portugal might be Portuguese if you click on the DNA matches tab you can see who you are possibly related to and even contact them it shows here I have a possible DNA match with someone in France if you want to learn about your ethnicity my Heritage has a promotion going right now click the link in the bio and use the coupon code to get free shipping you will also get a 30 day free trial the purpose of this video is not to complain about living in Portugal but to give Americans a realistic perspective on what it's like to live here don't get me wrong I absolutely love living in Portugal but moving here as an American or a foreigner certainly doesn't come without challenges sometimes it just feels like nothing is going right and even though you have everything organized and prepared you just keep getting smashed down with issues and it just feels like mom I'm trying to make a video here can you please keep it down I just read an article today from The Business Insider in the United States talking about Americans moving in droves to Portugal in search for a better quality of life and a lower cost of living but I feel like articles like this lack a lot of depth and fail to give Insight on what it's really like to live here in Portugal firstly let's discuss how the locals feel about Americans moving in spoiler alert they're not too happy about it according to eurostat the European Union statistic agency Portugal's housing prices Rose 157 percent from 2020 to 2021 and rents Rose 112 from 2015 to 2021. considering the wages in Portugal are some of the lowest in Western Europe This price increase has made it very hard for locals to sustain their living protests on Airbnb and local accommodations have been going on for the past couple years because the locals are being priced out of their houses and can't afford to live in places like Lisbon Porto or the Elgar anymore a lot of people even consider the al-goth not a part of Portugal anymore these places are losing their authenticity and starting to become large tourist traps but Portugal really wasn't on Americans Radars until the last couple of years I think the pandemic had a major impact on Americans that were clocking in to nine to five jobs pre-pandemic and once they started working from home they didn't want to give that up people became used to this idea of working from home and so as people started to get called back in their offices Americans naturally look for places where they could have a better quality of life and never returned to their nine to five jobs there is this perception that Portugal is so much much cheaper than the United States but is this really true sure if you compare the daily cost of living with States like California or New York then obviously Portugal will be less than half of the general cost of living but if you come from a place in the middle of America the price might not be that drastic especially because the hidden costs of Portugal can really start to add up when you look at the price tag on cars in Portugal they seem to be outrageously expensive take this Toyota RAV4 hybrid for instance that has a starting price in the US at around 31 000 MSRP but in Portugal this same make and model is priced at almost 48 000 Euros however there is one caveat here MSRP sales for cars in the United States don't include the tax and in Portugal the sales tax or Eva is included in the advertised price however even in a state like California which is at the higher end of sales tax you would only end up paying a final price of around thirty four thousand dollars still much more affordable compared to the one in Portugal that is priced at almost 48 000 Euros and even after adding premium car insurance in the United States it probably won't add up to Portugal's ultimate price and one of the most expensive things about driving in Portugal are the highway tolls if you thought you were just going to be able to live in a van and travel cheaply by Highway everywhere in Portugal think again it's very expensive to drive in Portugal on the highways I recently went on a trip from Lisbon to Porto and spent about 80 Euros in tolls round trip that was actually more than the gas costed for the entire trip so there are roads you can take that don't have any tolls and a lot of the truck drivers are forced to use these rural country roads but they are much more dangerous and will add on quite a bit more time to your trip these are also usually windy roads that end up going through small villages with narrow roads it's not like being in the U.S where once you leave a big city you rarely pay tolls if you are driving across the country only if you're Crossing Bridges or you're driving on the East Coast that being said what if you live in a city and you don't ever drive anywhere while compared to living in other big metropolitan cities in the U.S then your cost of living would certainly be less in Portugal and after factoring in how affordable things like health and car insurance is in Portugal for me it does end up being a little bit less so it really depends on your lifestyle and your spending habits now let's talk about one of the hottest topics taxes in blogs and YouTube articles we see claims on how Portugal has some of the best tax incentives for retirees or expats moving to Portugal but the non-habitual tax regime only lasts for 10 years and at the end of that 10 years you will go back to paying the normal price that all Portuguese citizens pay sure 10 years is a long time but when this ends it can definitely seem like a large taxation than you were used to and hit you like a bag of bricks or bags of money also one thing that no one talks about as much is that you have to have a skilled job and qualify for the nhr which not everyone does if you are used to the fast pace of a capitalist culture where the consumer is always right then Portugal slow pace can sometimes feel excruciating but there is nothing that you can really do about it and you just need to accept and develop patience this is how most of southern Europe is but out of all of these the hardest part for me as an American living in Portugal has nothing to do with the culture or country at all being away from your family and friends especially while your elders are aging is very difficult not being able to watch your nieces and nephews grow up can sometimes feel like you're missing out luckily we live in a time with FaceTime and video chat but sometimes it just doesn't feel like enough this is the one you hear a lot about when talking about Portugal the bureaucracy bureaucracy bureaucracy sometimes State processes like getting your driver's license or getting access to the Universal Health Care can seem like a nightmare in Portugal how they deal with foreigners can almost seem like a case-by-case basis that is being interpreted by the state worker that is dealing with you you might visit one office that tells you one thing only to go to another office that tells you another you hear absolute horror stories of people showing up to their immigration meetings at the SEF which is the immigration offices of Portugal only to be met by a sign that says closed for the holiday or for a strike when they had scheduled disappointment sometimes as far as six months in advance so you can see how people would be frustrated if you had to wait six months for an appointment only to be canceled that day when you got there also so be prepared for documents to be misspelled or to have some errors on it as I've had a couple of State documents have some errors that I had to send back a couple times to be corrected so make sure to have patience if you are dealing with these Services as they're not so used to dealing with Americans and they are also kind of doing it as it develops so have some patience for the process I am very happy to be here in Portugal and I have no plan on leaving but I want to make sure that Americans know what they are getting themselves into and Portugal isn't some place with rainbows and kittens raining everywhere if you can't tell by my video there is a lot of intentional satire as Theodore Roosevelt once said comparison is the thief of joy you will never be happy if you move or visit somewhere and want it to be like the place you just came from or else why would you have come in the first place yeah sometimes YouTubers hook you with some click bait title because that's the only way we can get you to watch our videos because the YouTube algorithm is designed that way and it kind of sucks but hopefully if you're still watching I can inspire you to let go of your expectations and just enjoy the ride life is too short to be bothered with negativity and stress travel isn't always pretty it isn't always comfortable sometimes it hurts it even breaks your heart but that's okay the journey changes you it should change you it leaves marks on your memory and your Consciousness on your heart and on your body you take something with you hopefully you leave something good behind and if you're lucky you might just end up in Portugal [Music] thank you if you want to see more content about Portugal make sure to hit the like And subscribe button because I'll be posting videos every single week on this YouTube if you want to support me check out my patreon account the link is in the bio below this is Dave in Portugal and we'll see you next time [Music] thank you [Music]

Channel: Dave in Portugal

Views: 235,223

Keywords: Living in Portugal, Moving to Portugal, Lisbon, Algarve, D7 Visa in Portugal, D7 Visa, D8 Remote Work Visa, Dave in Portugal, American in Europe, Algarve Addicts, Stay Classy Vlog, Madiera, Porto, Porto Portugal, Oporto, Move to Portugal, NHR Tax Scheme Portugal, Portuguese, Why Portugal Didn't Work out for me, Is Portugal worth moving to?, Don't Move to Portugal, American in Portugal

Id: GzFga3paXiA

Length: 12min 57sec (777 seconds)

Published: Sun Jun 18 2023