

Ask HN: Where can I move cheaply to work by myself for a year? - tamam

I am a US citizen and want to quit my job and move to a place where I can work on a project for maximum one year, but I could settle for 6 months. I&#x27;ve traveled a lot and am willing to eat the cost of a round-trip ticket. Language won&#x27;t be an issue; I speak many languages and would be thrilled to learn another.<p>I&#x27;d need to find a location that has high speed internet, is reasonably safe, amenable to a US citizen legally staying without an income for six to twelve months, and whose cost of living is far less than the bay area. I know places in the US where I could do this, but I&#x27;d like to take the opportunity to live somewhere else.<p>I welcome all suggestions. Thank you!
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casuncion
Manila. 1\. Great weather (except for this most recent typhoon, we were all
safe in the city) 2\. Fast internet 3\. Lots to do both in terms of day and
short cheap trips to both domestic destinations and nearby Asian countries 3\.
Inexpensive cost of living- food, housing rentals and transportation. Only
thing expensive is buying clothes (import tax) so just don't shop here. 4\.
Friendly people and easy immigration process- long stay visa 5\. Almost
everyone speaks English. Can easily learn Tagalog (esp. if you speak Spanish)

~~~
gexla
Yep, I don't think there is any better place than the Philippines for cheap
places for people from the U.S.

English speaking needs a bit more emphasis. Not only does nearly everyone
speak English, but English is an official language right along with Tagalog.
Most signs are in English. you have little to no need to learn Tagalog. When
two Filipino's from different parts of the country have a conversation, they
are just as likely to speak in English as they are in Tagalog. It's likely
they get more practice speaking English in their day to day living unless they
live in Tagalog speaking areas.

You missed a huge point. You can stay there for a year without having to do a
visa run. You just have to renew your tourist visa regularly. It's fast and
easy.

I would suggest also looking at other areas of the country. I live in
Dumaguete which isn't too big and not too small. There are houses and
apartments all over the city for $100 - $150 / month. There are even pretty
decent hotels you can live in for around $300 / month (which of course comes
with paid everything.) A nice month to month foreigner run apartment would
cost around the same. I haven't tried to live in Manila but I'm assuming it's
generally more expensive than the rest of the country.

~~~
nolok
Do you know where you can find a good place to rent without already being on
site ? AirBnB obviously costs a lot more

~~~
gexla
Right, I wouldn't go through AirBnB here. Just do a search for hotels in the
city you are looking at and that should give you an idea for prices for the
short term. The best way to locate houses and apartments is to drive around
the city collecting phone numbers and to talk to other foreigners. Stay in the
hotel while you are getting familiar with the city and see what kind of deal
you can negotiate for long term stay. You don't have to stick with that deal,
just keep it open as a fallback option. There are some sites where you can get
prices for rentals and purchases, but those are sky high. Your only option is
boots on the ground.

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elviejo
May I suggest San Miguel de Allende México "the best city in the world" It has
the second largest population of US citizens outside of the USA (second to
london)

[http://www.cntraveler.com/readers-choice-awards/best-
cities-...](http://www.cntraveler.com/readers-choice-awards/best-cities-
world_slideshow_item24_25)

Because of the large expat community is expensive for mexican standards but
cheap compared to the US

You could also use it as a platform to learn spanish.

My second suggestion is my own home town Zacatecas, México much cheaper than
San Miguel de Allende, good climate (it gets cold but it doesn't snow)

[http://www.visitmexico.com/en/zacatecas](http://www.visitmexico.com/en/zacatecas)

if you have further questions you can email me at: agarciafdz at googles email
free email service.

~~~
marquis
If Mexico is a consideration you can get 20BG symmetrical fibre internet from
Axtel for under $50 a month. Various locations. It's excellent internet, have
used it in Mexico City which is a very easy place to live inexpensively and
well.

Not sure how old this map is or what areas are covered exactly:
[http://juridicoriva.com/cobertura2.html](http://juridicoriva.com/cobertura2.html)

I found the coastal sides of Mexico a bit difficult, but that's because the
internet is slow and the humidity is very very bad for electronics (unless you
like living with AC on constantly). But cheap and quick to get to for a beach
or surf-weekend when you need to get out.

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gregjor
Thailand. Cheap, good food, fast internet. Easy to get around without fluency
in Thai. Enough expats to speak English with when you want to, but not so many
that you are easily isolated from Thai society. Chiang Mai has good weather
most of the year and is less congested than Bangkok.

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mjdn
Jerusalem. Reasons:

[1] your screen name translates to "good/OK" in local Arabic so you can answer
both "Who are you?" and "How are you?" with the same sentence. Think of the
efficiency gains!

[2] _very_ multilingual society - Hebrew, Arabic, English, Russian, Yiddish,
French, (Amhari?), Aramaic + others

[3] safe (yes), cheap, good internet, tourist visa renewable every three
months by crossing border

~~~
dorfuss
cheap? come on! Jerusalem's not cheap at all!

~~~
mjdn
You might be right, and cheap is relative. I spent time there in 2007, which
is a while ago. My money was in euro and I came from Ireland where cost of
living was quite high. Both dollar and euro are now weaker against the shekel
than in 2007, but I think it's still a good destination for someone from an
area with high wages and comparatively strong currency.

1 Bed apartments can be had for between $500-$600/month and sharing is a lot
cheaper than that.

[http://www.homeless.co.il/rent/inumber4=1$$inumber4_1=1$$sea...](http://www.homeless.co.il/rent/inumber4=1$$inumber4_1=1$$searchfor=%D7%99%D7%A8%D7%95%D7%A9%D7%9C%D7%99%D7%9D)

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muddauber
I'm admittedly biased on this one. Consider the following:

* Low cost of living (housing ~33% of Bay Area) * Extremely low crime rate * Beautiful outdoors. Mountains, streams, heavily forested,... * Easy access to high bandwidth internet * Same timezone (or 1-2 hours) to all US Customers * Small but high-quality dev & University communities * Frighteningly devoted local & state infrastructure * English as the main language * No visa restrictions * No international plane ticket expenses

Here's the kicker. It's West Virginia.

~~~
f7t7ft7
He'd have to buy a pickup truck, though.

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WD-42
Everywhere is cheap compared to the Bay Area, with the exception of New York
and maybe London. Move as close as Oregon and you'll see your cost of living
drop by half.

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kcovia
If you're staying in the US, I heartily recommend Pittsburgh. It's really
cheap (1br apartment + food + transport will run you $1000 - $1500 / month),
or $500ish if you don't mind getting a room in a bigger house. There's a ton
of stuff to do when you want to get away from the computer.

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pallavkaushish
You can live in India. Best cities would be Bangalore, Delhi or Mumbai.

Pros of living in India:

1\. Cost of living is way too less compared to Bay area. You can rent a very
decent house for INR 20000 per month (~$333) or ~$4000 per year.

2\. Bangalore was ranked the 19th best city in the world for startup
environment by Startup Genome report.

3\. Tons of startup groups and meetups, people are really helpful and
supportive.

4\. You can find smart people to hire at a fraction of a cost.

5\. Good internet connectivity.

6\. Getting VISA for extended stay would be very easy considering you're a US
citizen.

7\. Language would not be a big barrier because most of the educated
population understands and speaks English.

If you want to know more or have any questions, my email is in my profile.

~~~
bruceb
I am not sure where you would get a house in Mumbai for $333 unless it is way
out on the outskirts. You could share a flat for that though. Food is cheap if
you like Indian food. Don't drink the water.

You can get 10 year tourist visa that is good 6 months at a time. All you have
to do is leave the country and come back. It used to be you had to be out for
two months but they scrapped that rule some countries.

Setting things up on a tourist visa will be a pain. Getting internet will be a
pain. Better to split with neighbor or have Indian flat mate do it. Internet
may go out sometimes.

Same thing with getting a scooter or car.

There will be a lot of tech stuff to be involved in though.

~~~
pallavkaushish
I can't say about Mumbai because I haven't lived there but in Delhi and
Bangalore you can get a decent house in many of the major locations for $333 a
month. You would need to search for it though because finding houses is a big
challenge these days.

Getting internet is not a pain, it takes 2 days to get one from any private
company like Airtel and about 1.5 weeks if you take it from a government
company like BSNL. The connection works fine most of the time though
occasional hiccups are inevitable in India.

------
throwawayyyz
Ecuador. You will not regret it. My first choice would be north of Quito, in
the Ibarra region. Second choice would be Cuenca and the surrounding area. In
fact, there's a good chance we (wife and two kids) will be heading down there
for a year in a few months.

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brentm
So as a disclaimer I currently live in New York so I am not saying this as a
resident.

From my times visiting Nashville it seemed like a really nice city. I put some
light research into rental options earlier this year and the prices seemed
very affordable, especially in the suburbs. A few friends of mine rented a
good size house down there for rather cheap and love it.

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throwmeaway2525
OP was clear about looking outside the US, but since I (and others) seem to
really want to talk about this:

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6702111](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6702111)

(Not trying to steal the OP's thunder--this is a separate discussion.)

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scriptstar
Mom and Dad basement!

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jophde
Don't forget to add about 10-20% to the prices for exchanging money or using
your debit card. I live in Chile right now. Living in Middle America would be
_much_ cheaper.

~~~
karlkeefer
You need to get yourself a Schwab Investor Checking account - no ATM fees and
only 1% for foreign exchange. I travel a lot and this has saved me bundles.

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benologist
Costa Rica. It's a short flight to the states, and you get a new visa every
time you leave the country for 72 hours aka visit a neighboring country for a
weekend.

~~~
ndcrandall
You can visit Panama next door for a while, it's very low cost for foreigners.
They use the US dollar so no currency exchange needed. If I remember correctly
it's simple to get a 30, 60 or 90 day tourist visa.

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constantx
I highly recommend Saigon, Vietnam :) It meets all of your requirements, and
close enough to other Asian countries to travel if needed.

$2 pho, $1 banh mi.

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throwmeaway2525
Also see:

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6703058](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6703058)

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vincie
Tonga, Tokelau, Tahiti and some other small Pacific islands now have something
better than dial-up.

Edit: typo

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adultSwim
Middle America if trying to minimize cost. Cheap US city if you want to
balance it with other factors.

