To continue my story, after receiving my visa and selling my house I had to figure out how to have access to my Social Security, annuity and pension. This was much more difficult than I had imagined. The big banks of the US, CitiBank and Bank of America also were present in Malaysia, but as I soon found out, were considered to be completely different banks. I was promised by a CitiBank branch manager that I would have no problems transfering funds to Malaysia and accessing my funds in the US. I opened an account and found out none of this was true, unless I maintained a balance of $250,000. Of course everone has a balance like that! Finally I went to my local bank in Boston, where the manager suggested I access my money via ATM machines. I could use my online banking to pay bills at home and transfer funds from my account to another US bank account. As long as I did not use a foreign address, everything was fine. The foreign address thing is another preposterous practice of US banks. All banks say that a customer cannot maintain a US bank account with a foreign address. No matter how long the account had been opened previously. This is totally false. According to the US Treasury department, foreign addresses are allowed as long as the banks keep records of the addresses and notifies the department. This will cost the banks a little bit of money that will eat into the billions of dollars in profits they earn from all of us. Just another example of the banks charitable behavior and another pain for those who wish to retire abroad. Now I am here in Malaysia, but I still get upset when I think of these banks and the bid bonuses the CEOs get.
Here it is the day after the Federal Reserve's two day meeting. The only news was the complete lack of news. Ben Bernanke is continuing business as usual. Printing money and easing the way for the rich to become even richer. On April 26, Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner made statements regarding the governments total support for the dollar and the very next day the Fed's actions pummel the dollar anew. This isn't the first time Geithner has made supportive statements for the dollar. It just goes to show that talk is cheap when it come to the dollar. Actions speak louder than words, so it appears that the dollar and American expats will continue to suffer. It's still more affordable here in Malaysia.
I gathered all the information I needed to complete my MM2H Visa and sent it to an agent I contracted with to complete the application. After a couple of months I was approved. I had to go to Kuala Lumpur to pick up my visa and open a
Fixed Deposit (Certificate of Deposit), which was necessary to insure I could afford to live there. I made arrangements and picked up my visa in April of 2007. The hard part came next. I had to sell my house in a very depressed housing market. I put my house on the market in October, but didn't sell it until May. Once I sold it I made arrangements to retire, set up my pension, purchase an annuity and plan my move. Once I closed on the sale of the house I transferred most of the money to Malaysia to buy another house and car. One week later i flew to Penang to start a new life in retirement. The whole procedure was extremely stressfull, especialy selling the house. The next most stressfull part of relocating abroad was dealing with the US banking system. Unless you have millions the banks don't want anything to do with you, living overseas. That story will be in another post.
I was meaning to write a few more posts to explain how I got to where I am today, but I just heard the financial news. It appears that the Federal Reserve will continue to bail out the billionaire banks and businesses that put the world in this economic mess. The more the Feds print money the lower the dollar goes. For those of us who live overseas this is very bad news. When I first came to Malaysia the exchange rate was $1 = 3.6 Malaysian Ringgits. As of today the rate is $1 = 2.98 Ringgits. The dollar is becoming "funny money'. Thanks Feds.
I was fed up with the snow and bitter cold weather of Boston and decided that I would find a warmer climate in which to retire. Other than a warmer climate I needed some place where I could comfortably live on my pension and social security. I visted Taiwan, Vietnam, Thailand, China, Singapore and Malaysia. I really loved Thailand, but it was difficult to buy property and move there. I had met Kevin before visiting Malaysia and was very comfortable with him and with Malaysia. Malaysia had a program called Malaysia My Second Home (MM2H) which allowed for a long term visa. I finally decided to move move to Malaysia when I retired. I then had to apply for the MM2H visa and make the financial arrangements. I had my goal in mind and I was determined to reach that goal.
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