There are lots of logistics involved in traveling and moving abroad. Use this list of services to save yourself time & simplify your journey.
You can get access to the Free Move Abroad Toolkit right now! It'll help you start getting prepared to leave the U.S. and move to another country! It might be easier and faster than you think!
A virtual mailbox is a type of service that provides a physical mailing address that you can use for all your mail. Most services offer addresses in multiple states so you can choose a location that works best for you.
The virtual mailbox we’ve been using since 2016 is called Traveling Mailbox and we couldn’t be happier with their service!
This has been our go-top mobile app for learning very basic vocabulary and sentence structure for several languages. We started using it in Denver to study Spanish long before we moved to Ecuador and it helped us make a smoother landing.
We’ve also been using Duolingo to learn the basics of other languages as we slow travel, such as Portuguese, Italian, French, Greek, Turkish, and Vietnamese.
This is our absolute favorite way to learn a foreign language because it takes popular movies, TV shows, YouTube videos, etc., and converts them into interactive language learning tools.
With LingoPie, you’ll be able to hear the language you’re studying as it’s spoken conversationally by native speakers. That really helps you get used to hearing the sounds and pronunciations.
This is a great language learning tool if you like listening to music. We always ask the people we meet who speak English as a second (or third) language, “How did you learn?” Nearly every single person says they learned English by listening to music or watching TV and movies.
If it works for them, it can work for us, too! And Lirica makes it fun and easy.
A VPN encrypts everything from end-to-end so no one can see what you’re doing online. Your data looks like gobbledygook to hackers so they can’t do anything with it.
Surfshark is our go-to VPN. We’ve used it all over the world without any issues. You may have seen us talk about them in our videos (they often sponsor our channel).
NordVPN is another VPN that we’ve also used. The main benefit of NordVPN is that they have the most servers in the most countries giving you more options for connectivity (although that doesn’t really matter for most people).
Data brokers, marketers and other types of businesses are tracking and storing your personal information and using it to manipulate you (or scam you).
We use a service called Incogni to remove our personal information from hundreds of data broker websites. This company is owned by the same parent company as SurfShark.
An eSIM App allows you to connect to local data networks with your smartphone while you’re traveling. It doesn’t provide a local phone number, but it does provide access to LTE, 4G and 5G mobile data networks.
We’ve been using Airalo for several years in over a dozen countries. Most eSIMs cost around $5 per week. You can choose from several different packages in over 200 countries and regions.
This is another good option for eSIMs. We found in Thailand and some other countries, the Saily plans are cheaper than Airalo so we now check both apps when we arrive in a country and choose the best plan for our needs. This company is owned by the same parent company as SurfShark.
Safety Wing provides nomad insurance, which is travel medical insurance that covers you for extended travel all over the world, while outside your home country.
We still have private insurance through our provider in Ecuador, but we’ve heard good things about Safety Wing from people who use it so it’s worth checking out if you need travel health insurance.
When you travel or live abroad, at some point, you’ll need to transfer money from your bank to someone else’s bank in another country to pay for services, furniture, etc.
The biggest name in the money transfer business is Wise.com, and we’ve been using them for years to pay contractors and service providers in other countries.
The most important thing to look for when you choose a credit card for travel or living abroad is to choose one that does NOT charge international transaction fees.
We have a Chase Sapphire Preferred card that comes with a lot of travel benefits. We also have a Capital One card that does not charge foreign transaction fees.
The most important thing to look for when you choose a bank for travel or living abroad is to choose one that does NOT charge international ATM fees and also refunds the fees charged by local banks.
We have an account at Charles Schwab that comes with a fee-free ATM card and refunds all ATM fees charged by other banks at the end of each month.
If you’re still in the planning phase of your move abroad, now is the perfect time to hire an accountant who can make sure you’re taking the deductions you’re allowed to take, and save yourself the hassle of refiling and the money from overpaying.
If you’ve been living abroad for awhile and you haven’t taken any deductions, it’s worth a chat with an expat accountant. You might be owed money from the government.
By using our Taxes For Expats Link, you’ll get a $25 account credit that you can use when you file your taxes.
The Free Move Abroad Toolkit will help you start planning to leave the United States and move to another country.
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