The top 6 questions you should ask yourself before becoming location- independent

Considerations before leaving

Is liv­ing and work­ing over­seas in your future? There’s always so much to do and so lit­tle time. How do you tell the dif­fer­ence between the must-dos and the would-like-to-dos so you can stop pro­cras­ti­nat­ing and get on the road? What are the impor­tant con­sid­er­a­tions before leaving?

1. What can you automate?

If there’s a will, there’s a way. That includes find­ing things to stop you from mak­ing a jump that will change your life for­ev­er. As they say, the only things that are cer­tain are death and tax­es. So the deci­sion you have to make is: what will you do with the time you have left?

If you have your heart set on trav­el­ing the world, one of the deci­sions you will have to make is what can you automate.

Is the job you are cur­rent­ly doing some­thing you could do from any­where? For exam­ple, con­sult­ing, con­duct­ing webi­na­rs, writ­ing, online teach­ing, and many tech careers could just as eas­i­ly be done from Hawaii, Tahi­ti, or the top of a moun­tain pro­vid­ed you have access to a lap­top, a phone, and inter­net ser­vice. So what’s hold­ing you back?

If you can, or already do work online, half the bat­tle is already won. 

Rent out your house to pay your mort­gage. If you are not sure how long you will be gone, you could offer your res­i­dence as a vaca­tion rental for a few months or half a year. Even if it does­n’t cov­er the entire mort­gage, your cost to try out loca­tion inde­pen­dence is great­ly reduced. If you use a man­age­ment ser­vice, expect to pay about ten per­cent of the rental income for peace of mind while you’re away. 

You can use bill pay to auto­mate pay­ments and set up a trust­ed per­son with pow­er of attor­ney to sign for things while you are away. Addi­tion­al­ly, there are ser­vices for long-term trav­el­ers that include a per­ma­nent address you can use to renew your dri­ver’s license, pass­port, as well as your vot­ers, boat, and car reg­is­tra­tions. The ser­vice most often rec­om­mend­ed by full-time cruis­ers is St. Bren­dan’s Isle in Flori­da. For about the cost of break­fast, they will col­lect and sort your mail. Your mail can be for­ward­ed or scanned for you to receive a vir­tu­al copy. You don’t have to wor­ry about miss­ing impor­tant cor­re­spon­dences or the dead-give­away pile of mail at your front door while you are traveling.

2. Do you really need a safety net?

If trav­el­ing con­sumes your soul, if there is noth­ing in the world you want more, if wan­der­lust is in your blood, and you are chomp­ing at the bit to get start­ed, maybe the safe­ty net is not as impor­tant to you. So, sell the house, the car, and all your world­ly goods. Use what­ev­er left­over mon­ey you have to help fund your trav­els. You can always re-acquire these things when, and if, you return. Remem­ber, St. Bren­dan’s Isle can save you from hav­ing to mod­i­fy your itin­er­ary to renew your information.

3. Is everyone all in?

Does your fam­i­ly share your desire to relo­cate? Are you and your spouse on the same page? How old are you kids? What are their goals? 

Our kids view­points weighed more heav­i­ly in our deci­sion to trav­el because they are old­er. Our daugh­ter will be a junior dur­ing our gap year. We would have liked to have left soon­er, but our youngest was just start­ing high school last year, so we also want­ed to give her the expe­ri­ence of hav­ing a for­mal high school experience. 

Our plan will allow us to be back for my daugh­ter’s senior year of high school, which she wants to com­plete with her friends. We will prob­a­bly stay on land an addi­tion­al year for her sis­ter to grad­u­ate as well, before tak­ing off again permanently.

Can you make a com­pro­mise with­in your fam­i­ly that every­one can live with? Ask­ing your kids for input shows that you val­ue their opin­ion and might help get them on board if you show them that this is their trip as well. Encour­age them to research loca­tions on the itin­er­ary to dis­cov­er their own places of inter­est that you could incor­po­rate into the trip.

4. Will the experience outweigh the possible negative outcomes? Can these be mitigated?

One of my con­sid­er­a­tions before mak­ing the jump was giv­ing up the secu­ri­ty of my career. How­ev­er, I always knew wait­ing to trav­el until I retired was not an option. Still, fear was an issue. What if I could­n’t get anoth­er job in my field after I return? What if we lost our house? What if we regret­ted it?

I had one major expe­ri­ence to draw con­fi­dence from, as well as lots of advice from peo­ple who had lived to regret not going.

A few years ago, I had the oppor­tu­ni­ty to teach Eng­lish in Chi­na. I got on a plane for my first Eng­lish teach­ing posi­tion with faith and a lan­guage dic­tio­nary. I returned home with wan­der­lust. It was scary and uncer­tain, but I would­n’t trade the expe­ri­ence. And the neg­a­tive out­comes nev­er mate­ri­al­ized. In fact, all of those fears and what-ifs were in my head. They were just excus­es. Now, my biggest fear is what if we don’t go, or even what if we wait to go.

As we pre­pare to sail away, I have met both peo­ple who live with regret because they wait­ed too long and their part­ner died unex­pect­ed­ly, as well as peo­ple who wait­ed so long they have giv­en up on their dreams. We recent­ly met a man who built his sail­boat over the course of ten years so that he could sail the world. Now that the boat is done, he is prepar­ing to sell it because he says he is too old for his dream.

Any­thing we lose, we can get back, except for time. The only for me to avoid neg­a­tive out­comes is to live with­out regrets. Spend­ing time with my fam­i­ly trav­el­ing is my way of liv­ing with­out regrets.

5. Can you manage fear and uncertainty?

That is a ques­tion you are going to have to think long and hard about. Noth­ing in life is guar­an­teed. Your job may be secure now, and in a few years, you could be let go from work. In fact, we had a friend who had this exact thing hap­pen to him. A year away from retire­ment, and he was fired so the com­pa­ny could save some mon­ey. So, what are you afraid of? Make a list. Brain­storm solu­tions. For exam­ple, if you are afraid of run­ning out of mon­ey, devel­op skills that will make you mon­ey as you travel. 

If you can’t find a solu­tion that works for you, reach out to oth­ers. There is a wealth of knowl­edge avail­able to you, if you ask. Once you set off, you will face times of fear and uncer­tain­ty, but in the mean­time, you will have devel­oped the skills and the con­fi­dence to keep going. 

6. Would you regret not doing it?

I have met many peo­ple who will spend their entire lives in one place. They enjoy being a mem­ber of the com­mu­ni­ty and rel­ish the tra­di­tion of doing the same things year after year. 

I work with teach­ers who have had three gen­er­a­tions of stu­dents from the same fam­i­ly or now work with col­leagues they once taught in ele­men­tary school. Los­ing that sense of com­mu­ni­ty would be a regret for them, not trav­el­ing the world, and def­i­nite­ly not liv­ing in a for­eign coun­try. So, the answer to the ques­tion of regret is a very per­son­al one. The answer can­not be black and white. For many peo­ple, some­where in between the always and the nev­er is best; trav­el­ing dur­ing the sum­mer or dur­ing the hol­i­days feeds their souls enough to have no regrets.

How about you? How would you answer the question?

Decision Time!

Once you have worked your way through these six ques­tions, you will be bet­ter pre­pared to decide if loca­tion-inde­pen­dence is for you. More­over, when you should leave should be clear­er as well. After look­ing at the con­sid­er­a­tions before mak­ing the jump, will you jump? 

I can’t wait to hear from you. As always, don’t for­get to sub­scribe and fol­low us on social media!

Fair winds and fol­low­ing seas!

-Elyza