The Unsexy Steps That Change Everything

It is Friday night. You made it through another week. The commute alone felt like it stole something from you, hours you will never see again spent in transit that drained you before the workday even started. You did not cook tonight. Takeout is, again, the only thing on the menu. You had plans once, maybe, earlier in the week, something social, something that sounded good on Tuesday. By Thursday you already knew you would cancel. And now it is nine o’clock and you are on the couch with nothing left, scrolling through your phone because the empty brightness of the screen is the only company you have the energy for.

Somewhere in the middle of that scroll, you picture the other Friday. The one where you are on a train headed for the countryside outside of a European city you are only just learning to navigate. Rosé in hand. Texting the group chat with girlfriends who were strangers six months ago and are now the people you make weekend plans with. You can feel the afternoon light through the window. You can feel how your shoulders sit differently when your life is actually yours.

You have done the research. You have read the threads and scrolled the listings and looked at apartments in neighborhoods you cannot yet pronounce. You have pictured the coffee shop on the corner and the walk to the market and the way your mornings might feel. And all of it still lives in your head. In a note on your phone. In a browser tab that has been open for weeks. You keep going back to it. You keep feeding the dream. And still, you cannot give your best friend a date for when she can come visit you in your future home.

I know the feeling of longing for something that feels so real and so close you can almost rest your hand on it. And yet feeling completely paralyzed by the steps it will take to get there, because you cannot quite see the end just yet. The specific, boring, unsexy list of things that stood between “I am doing this” and “my house is unpacked and I am actually living abroad” was not something anyone handed me. I built it by making every mistake on it first.

If you were here last week, I walked through the first half of that list: choosing a country, setting a real timeline, sorting passports, doing destination research that prepares you for a Tuesday morning and not just a golden Saturday afternoon, building savings with a real number, and taking a scouting trip long enough to see the place clearly. I know how isolating that phase can be. I hope it helped you feel less alone in it.

If you did not read it, you are still in the right place. You can find the first six steps here. What follows stands on its own. Just like you will!

I have sat in closets deciding what crosses an ocean and what stays behind. I have driven hours to consulate appointments and taken flights just to sit in a waiting room. I have been on hold for entire afternoons and shown up at immigration offices only to be told to come back tomorrow. I understand how unromantic it feels when all you want is to leave the life that is causing you pain. But this is the part that actually gets you there.

Wherever you are in this phase, these next six steps are what I needed most at this exact stage. So I am sharing them with you.

Step Seven: Figure out what your visa actually requires.

The internet is full of confident answers about visa processes, and most of them are not yours. Someone else’s D7 story happened under different rules, at a different consulate, during a different administrative moment than the one you are walking into.

I have applied for dozens of visas, residency in multiple countries, citizenship through descent in Portugal, and residency for my own mother overseas. I have sat across from consular officers in more than one language, answering questions about my plans, my finances, my health, my vaccination records, the photos of my grandparents, and every piece of information I could think of and plenty I never anticipated. Every single time, something surprised me. One consulate told me I needed one year of tax returns. Another required three. The conflicting information is constant, and it can be completely contradictory.

Start with the government website of your destination country, the consular or immigration portal. Find the visa category that matches your situation and read the supporting document list carefully. Then interview a few immigration lawyers who specialize in your destination. Having someone who knows the system from the inside can save you months of confusion and wasted effort.

Most long-term residency visas require:

Proof of income: Bank statements and records going back several months, sometimes years.
Criminal background check: Usually apostilled, sometimes translated. This step alone can take four to six weeks, and I have seen people nearly miss their consulate appointments because they underestimated how long it takes.
Documents: Usually apostilled, sometimes translated. Birth certificates, marriage licenses, divorce decrees, and anything else specific to your case.
Proof of accommodation: A lease, a host letter, or proof of property ownership.
Health insurance: Coverage meeting specific local requirements, not a U.S. policy. I learned this one the hard way when I realized my American plan covered almost nothing when I was sick with COVID, navigating the health care systems abroad.
Application forms, photos, and fees: Paid online or at the consulate in person.

Processing timelines vary wildly, from two months to nine, depending on your visa type, consulate location, and their workload. A few things I wish someone had told me:

Call the consulate directly: For some countries, sending paperwork by regular mail is more efficient than emailing because certain agencies simply do not respond to email reliably. I spent weeks waiting for email replies that never came before I picked up the phone and had my answer in ten minutes.
Over-prepare your documents: If the list asks for one year of tax records, include three. I started doing this after my first application, when I watched the officer flip past every document I brought and ask for the one thing I did not have. After that, I never showed up without more than they asked for. You buy yourself time by being over-prepared, because they cannot send your application back for something you already provided.
Add personal detail: The more information you include, the more likely a real person on the other end feels invested in seeing your application through. I have included cover letters with my applications explaining why I was applying, what my plans were, and what my connection to the country was. I do not know for certain whether it made a difference, but I believe it did.

Work the math backward from the date you want to land and give every step more runway than you think it needs.

Step Eight: Understand what moving abroad will do to your taxes.

I did not think seriously about taxes until I was already dealing with them across borders, staring at forms in two languages and wondering which government I owed money to first. A single phone call with an accountant who specialized in Americans abroad made me realize how much I did not know about what the U.S. expected from me while I was living overseas. That call probably saved me thousands of dollars in penalties I did not even know existed.

It was not until I learned that I couldn’t open a foreign bank account because I am a U.S. tax resident, and some countries simply do not want any business with American taxpayers, that I understood how far-reaching this really is. I also could not manage my 401k from abroad because my address had changed, and I did not know what to do about it. By that point, I was already out of the country and could not take action until I was back on U.S. ground.

The United States is one of only two countries in the world that taxes its citizens on worldwide income regardless of where they live. Eritrea is the other. You can be living in Lisbon, paying Portuguese taxes, and you will still be filing a U.S. return every April.

There are mechanisms that help, and reporting requirements may have penalties if you miss them:

Foreign Earned Income Exclusion: Excludes a portion of foreign-earned income if you meet residency or physical-presence tests.
Foreign Tax Credit: Offsets U.S. tax liability with taxes paid abroad.
FBAR: Annual disclosure required once foreign accounts cross certain thresholds. This is one that catches people off guard because nobody tells you about it until you are already behind on filing it.
FATCA: Parallel reporting obligations depending on your asset levels.
State tax residency: California and New York, in particular, continue claiming you as a resident unless you formally establish domicile elsewhere. If you are leaving from either of these states, this is not something to figure out later. It is something to figure out now because you cannot make these changes from abroad.

Your destination country has its own tax system, and some visa programs include preferential tax periods. Portugal, Spain, France, Italy, and Brazil each have their own treaties, and the rules shift frequently. What was true eighteen months ago may not be true today.

Hire a tax professional who specializes in Americans living abroad before you move. Not after. If you are working with someone to plan your entire move, they should connect you with the right specialist. The penalties for getting this wrong are real and almost entirely avoidable.

Step Nine: Decide what happens to the home you are leaving.

I stood in the kitchen of a place I had lived in for years and realized that letting go of a home is its own kind of grief, even when the leaving is something you chose. A home is the physical evidence of a life you built. The spot where the light comes in at four in the afternoon makes the room feel like it belongs to you.

But I also know now that letting go of physical things to expand into a greater life is worth every hard moment. I decided to leave everything behind and carry only two suitcases into my next chapter. The memory of everything from my previous lives remains in photos now. And that is enough for me.

If you own, you have three paths:

Sell: Simplifies your finances. Removes the complexity of managing a property from thousands of miles away.
Rent it out: Preserves the asset and creates income. Turns you into a long-distance landlord with increasingly complicated tax implications, but can also serve as passive income proof for certain types of visas.
Keep it empty: Preserves every option. Requires you to carry the mortgage, insurance, and upkeep with no offsetting income.

If you rent:

Read your lease first: Many prohibit subletting outright.
Time your termination: Align it with your departure if possible.
If mid-lease: Study the early termination clause and calculate the real cost.

Make the decision early, and know you are already making the harder decision by choosing to leave.

Step Ten: Begin downsizing now.

You do not know how much emotional weight is hidden inside objects until you sit in a closet on a Saturday afternoon, holding a sweater from 2014 that brought you so much joy because it reminds you of a cozy fall evening when the air turned crisp, and you held your first pumpkin spice latte of the season while you talked for hours with your best friend.

The hardest part of it all is understanding that you are holding the physical evidence of who you used to be and deciding whether that version of you is coming along.

Do not leave this until the end. Otherwise, you will find yourself, like I did, in your old bedroom sleeping on a fold-out mattress on the floor because you already gave away the bed. It is 3:30 in the morning, and you need to be working at 7. You are getting three hours of sleep surrounded by piles of clothes and belongings, and you have no idea how much longer any of it is going to take.

Every object belongs to one of these: Sell. Donate. Scan. Shred. Store. Take. Trash.

If something is so particular to you, so much a part of your identity, whether it is the vintage leather boots you found in a tiny shop between Buenos Aires and Patagonia, or the scarves that became your favorite kind of souvenir, like the first find from my first trip to Italy, not knowing it would start a collection I carried through every country after. If it makes you who you are and you know you cannot find it again, and if it makes you happy, take it. But know that the more you take, the harder the process becomes, and the longer it takes to settle into the lightness of your new beginning.

Step Eleven: If you are moving with kids, their transition is its own project.

I have not moved countries with children. But I have worked closely with families who have, and I have watched what makes the difference between a child who lands excited and one who lands afraid. It comes down to preparation, honesty, and giving them something to look forward to that is theirs.

Children adapt better than adults fear they will, but they might need more support than adults usually plan for.

The school search starts earlier than you think. International schools in popular destinations run long waitlists, sometimes a full academic year out. Contact schools the moment you know your destination.

International Baccalaureate (IB): Strong for families who may live in more than one country.
British curriculum: Rigorous and structured.
American curriculum: Smoothest transition if your child may return to the US for college.
Local school: Deepest immersion, but requires a real language bridge.

And then have a heart-to-heart conversation with your kids. Paint a picture of what the future looks like. Pick up a copy of The Little Prince together in the language of the country you are moving to. Find picture books that show them the streets, the food, the landscape of the place that is about to become theirs. Let them fall in love with where they are going before they have to say goodbye to where they are.

Step Twelve: Decide what your work looks like on the other side.

I had a remote job. I felt stable. Other people in my department had already traveled internationally while keeping their positions. So when I asked my manager to let me take my job to France while I worked on my European citizenship, I held the dream that I could hold both lives at the same time. Instead, I was met with resistance and decline. I went through every channel. The company would not allow it, even though others had already done it. I watched my plans hit a fence I could not climb over.

That moment could have stopped everything. It did not. I found another way. And that is the part of this step that matters most: the first path you try may not be the one that works.

Start planning what your work looks like abroad now, while you still have options. And keep in mind that the options are wider than most people realize.

Staying with your current employer: Read your contract. Many remote positions include geographic restrictions. Have the HR conversation before your departure date is locked.
Shifting from W-2 to contractor: If your employer will not set up international payroll, a 1099 arrangement sometimes works. Get professional advice first.
Looking for new remote work: The gap between “remote within the US” and “genuinely remote from anywhere” is wider than the job postings suggest.
Freelancing or starting your own business: Going independent can open up more visa categories than you might be considering right now. Many countries have specific visa pathways for entrepreneurs and self-employed professionals that give you more flexibility than a traditional employment arrangement ever could.
Student visas: Enrolling in a program abroad can open doors to part-time local work opportunities and create pathways into the local job market that would not exist otherwise.
High-skilled worker visas: Several countries offer specific visa categories for professionals with in-demand expertise. If your skill set qualifies, this can be one of the most straightforward paths available.

Make sure your visa category and your income structure actually work together: Some visas require passive income only. Others are built for remote workers employed by foreign companies. If these do not match, you will find out at the worst possible time.

There are more ways into a life abroad than most people ever explore. A freelance income can qualify you for visa categories that a salaried position never would. A student visa for university or a language course can open doors that a traditional job cannot. I found another way, and then another one after that. The paths are there if you keep going after the first one closes.

Before next week

Look at the list from last week and the list you just finished reading. Put them together in a document that makes sense for you, and pick the two items out of the twelve that feel most important right now.

Then take fifteen minutes every day to sit with those two things. Just fifteen minutes.

Process what they look like for your life. Stop at fifteen minutes so you do not feel overwhelmed. Those fifteen daily minutes, focused on just two things, will take you from scrolling and researching to actually applying this knowledge to your own reality, whether you are ready to move in six months, twelve, or twenty-four.

There are many more logistical steps beyond these twelve, but this is the foundation. I will continue to guide you through this process. I have done it many times, and I will do it again and again, and I will do it with you.