I spend a couple months a year in either Costa Rica or Panama. There has never been any indication of drugs or violence. There might be, but I don't see it. Costa Rica is truly a democratic country. However, I am still leaning toward Portugal, which has no fixed deposit requirement, and is ranked number 2 as the safest country in the world to retire.

When I was in MM2H, the factor that caused me to give it up was that I am a dog lover, and Malaysia was not friendly to dogs.

well RobSG.. different strokes...and different experiences.... i have traveled extensively in Central/South America.. while Costa Rica and Panama are relatively safe.. on the surface.. the menace of drugs and associated violence exist, surely not as bad as Honduras or El Salvador, but there are areas of San Jose you dont want to be walking around casually...especially as a non-Spanish speaking Gringo

Portugal is beautiful ..but not tropical.. hope it works out wonderfully for u ... it will be much easier to assimilate culturally ...most anywhere in Europe for a North American.. Asia is much different..I understand your Dog issue.. MY being largely muslim.. consider dogs as unclean ..no judgement here.. just plain observation (they eat dogs in places in Asia ) ..... these are cultural differences and as a guest of the country .. we must honor/accept them.. or get outta dodge .. as you wisely chose to do

All the best

We've applied for PR in Panama about 15 years ago. So much bureaucracy made the whole process very complicated and expensive. As a result, an application got stuck somewhere and was lost and we were not even able to restart. Our two attorneys couldn't get any answer from the gov officials. We just lost interest. Then we've heard the stories of how gringos are treated as an ATM machine there...
Also, you need to know Spanish well in Panama.

A couple of interesting articles online today . .made me think the reason for suspension of MM2H program may not be entirely Covid-19 related :

https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/polit...mpaign=3101250

https://www.scmp.com/news/asia/south...mpaign=3023699

the old 'Chinese Invasion' fears may have something to do about abrupt suspension of the program.... ? Pandemic provided the convenient ruse ?

The second listed article is not just "online today", but already online for one year. The alleged misuse of MM2H by Chinese people predates Covid-19.

I hunted down some critiques of MM2H by folks who were portraying it as a "selling away our birthright" or filling the pockets of the government.

Most of the accusations seemed not to understand how MM2H worked and what the current restrictions and regulations were.

They even, falsely, accused the MM2H Program as being #17 on the list of tax dodges released by the OECD. I looked (they provided the link). It wasn't on the current list at all.

Residence/Citizenship by investment - Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development

Of course to receive tax residency in Malaysia, even under MM2H requires a physical presence of 182 Days. All the MM2H doe in regards to that is ALLOW one to spend that time in the country without obtaining other visas. If one fails to spend that much physical time in Malaysia one does not receive any special tax consideration.

But this may have been generated by this which seems to be an assertion by the Malay Mail that MM2H was listed as a tax dodge.


OECD blacklists Malaysia for ‘programme enabling tax dodgers’ - MalayMail News Article

https://www.malaymail.com/news/malay...odgers/1683834

Although Malaysia did end up on a list according to The Guardian...although again in the context of gaining citizenship or tax residence. How this relates to the MM2H is perplexing.

https://www.theguardian.com/business...emes-published

It seems that the OECD did release a list with Malaysia as having an Investment for Residency program in 2018.

https://www.internationalinvestment....ssport-schemes

But that there was little justification for what elements of the "golden visa" program (presumably MM2H, though perhaps the RM1 million property purchase program) fell astray. Was this the reason why MM2H no longer issues an identity card? Wouldn't the use of the MM2H Letter of Conditional Approval solve this by simply stating that the program requires 182 Day physical residence to achieve Tax Residency?


http://citizenlane.ch/wp-content/upl...tizen-Lane.pdf

Good Post RA.. (as always) . .somethings to ponder over .. I think the current hold up in the MM2H processing etc is related to pandemic and/or Malay internal politics more than concerns over tax evasion .. it may be part of the overall concern... nevertheless .. good post ..thanks

SushiFan: I did not imply its new news .. second link was embedded in the first article and pointed it out separately as it provided further context to .."hordes of coming" theory too damn popular with unscrupulous Malay Pols... sorry if i mislead.

I was just trying to indicate that one aspect of the charges against MM2H were not accurate. The OECD apparently reversed their view that MM2H was a "golden visa" for tax evasion. That assertion was simply an excuse to constrain or scuttle the program when (as you suggest) other issues are involved. The reduction of benefits for MM2H down through the years (no work permission, elimination of the imported car tax reduction, etc.) all suggest a concern that MM2H recipients are taking away opportunities from Malaysians or getting something that Malaysians cannot.