WHY WE CHOSE FRANCE
Why France won out over Portugal, Spain & Italy
This week’s video is about how we got approved for the French long-stay visa in just four days. But before we even filled out a single form, we had to answer the bigger question: why France?
Portugal, Spain, and Italy were all on our radar. Each one has amazing culture, food, and a slower rhythm of life than the U.S. But when we dug deeper, France came out on top for a few reasons that really mattered to us:
Taxes – Thanks to the U.S.–France tax treaty, our U.S. retirement income isn’t taxed locally in France. Portugal’s special NHR tax break just ended, Spain’s treaty wasn’t as protective, and Italy’s flat-tax option only works if you move to certain small towns.
Visa accessibility – France’s long-stay visitor visa (the VLS-TS) is clear, renewable, and doesn’t require investments or ancestry. Spain and Italy have solid visas too, but they’re stricter with income requirements and renewals.
Citizenship path – France offers the fastest and most straightforward path to citizenship for Americans without ancestry, and it supports dual citizenship.
Cultural fit – Markets, cafés, walkable cities, regional diversity…
France checked the boxes for the way we want to travel: slowly, with time to settle in and live like locals.
In the end, France simply made the most sense — financially, logistically, and for the kind of everyday life we wanted to build abroad. It checked all the right boxes and gave us the freedom to start this new chapter on our own terms.
– Scott & Liza
We set the full checklist down on the Coffee Table.— a place where we’ll keep extras like this so they’re easy to find later.
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