civilservant

You have no idea what you are getting into with respect to living and working in the US as a self employed person. Health insurance alone will be a substantial cost factor that you do not have experience with. For many, finances are something of an eye opener when they are considering the move.

Not to mention you are talking about retaining UK based income, which has tax implications, and a UK property, which will have capitals gains tax implications should you decide to sell while in the US.

Everything is interrelated when consider a transatlantic move.

tht

As others have noted your biggest issue is that you what to retire here, which a visa won’t help you with. You basically need a path to a green card because work visas are generally tied to an active job/business.

that probably means buying a green card via EB-5. But the current investment required for that is at least 5 or 6 tiles the budget you have indicated you have for buying an apt, and you may get back none of the invested capital, so you may be spending that entire sum to buy your green cards:
https://www.uscis.gov/working-in-the...vestor-program

To give you some context I came on a visa through work, it took me about 10 years to get from deciding to move here to getting here.

The issue of health insurance other posters mention is a real consideration. With so little time to work here you probably could not qualify for Medicare when you retire so you would be left with private insurance from an exchange.

Markg.uk1

Thanks for your honesty, it is looking more and more unlikely we will ever get there and i think my age is one of the biggest hurdles

Thanks again

SanDiegogirl

Options open to you:


- Your first post suggests that you would want to set up a studio in Florida. So for that route you would need something like an E-2 or EB-5 visa - both visas requires seeding money
- If you want to work for someone else you would need to get a company to sponsor you for an H-1B visa - this visa is usually for techncia/engineering/business/software engineering type people, and requires a degree
- You could try for an O-1 visa (exceptional ability)
- If you keep your current studio open you could look at getting yourself an L-1 visa (transferring yourself to your new studio)

As said earlier your proposal of buying a small property with $150K to $170 might prove difficult ......

You need to work for 10 years and/or get 40 credits via payroll to qualify for Medicare when you retire - otherwise its private individual health insurance and or pay extra into Medicare at a time you can qualify.

tht

if it’s warm weather you want look at some of the Caribbean islands, some of them “sell citizenship” or have other ways to allow people to live there . I also recall Portugal has a program for people get residency, but again age may be a factor there. Many places evaluate immigrants based on age because they want working age educated tax payers....

scrubbedexpat099

There are proposals that may well be of benefit to your situation, but exactly what that could entail who knows.

Quite a few options have been mentioned that could work, E2, O1 L1, details will matter, I would rule out E2 because you want to retire here.

Another option if your friend runs a Tattoo business is to sponsor you to immigrate using an EB3 that would tick all the boxes.

Markg.uk1

As said earlier your proposal of buying a small property with $150K to $170 might prove difficult ......

Why would this prove difficult we have seen a lot of properties for around this price or is it because were immigrants?

SanDiegogirl

Sorry, suppose it depends on where you are looking...you mentioned Sarasota which is a very popular area and I didn't see anything (houses) under $250K

RICH

Being immigrants will not affect price. Your range is reasonable for what I would need. Not a flashy holiday villa though!

steph0scope

I think you are referring to me when you said “spoken to like a child”. I am sorry to read that you took it that way. But sometimes we confuse what we don’t want to hear with rudeness or patronizing.

You are certainly in for a rude awakening if you think household bills are cheaper here than in the UK. You’re talking to people who have lived in both countries. The only expenses I have found to be cheaper here are petrol (although you tend to use a lot more so the saving is negated) and car tabs, but even that depends on the state. Car insurance, groceries, electricity, water, internet, mobile phone, property taxes (closest UK equivalent is council tax and even if you buy outright you’ll be stuck paying this for the rest of your life), eating out, healthcare, you name it, it’s more expensive here. Now, wages are often higher to offset this but for the self-employed it’s a different story.

I wrote “more to living here that the weather” because that is the only reason, so far, that you have given for wanting to come here. You have to realise that we see people week in, week out on this forum asking about moving to the US, and Florida seems to be the destination of choice for the majority, from people who have no idea of what it’s actually like and have only seen it as a holiday maker. You said “we love America” but I have to ask myself if you even know what America is.

Good luck. It’s not going to be easy. I believe in being realistic and not giving people false hope as they do on other forums, where I’ve seen people suggest that a hairdresser and a car mechanic can easily get visas to come here. Most of us came here through marriage and family. That is still by far the largest category of immigrants and the “easiest” way to get here. Work visas, however surprising it may seem, are very few and far between for a country of this size.

Markg.uk1

Yes, I was talking about you talking to me like I'm a child and now you're saying I'm confused about what you said, I came on this forum for advice not to be spoken down to,
as for household bills etc when did you last like in the UK ? bills now are probably a lot higher now than when you were here and we're all stuck paying bills for the rest of our lives so I don't know why you would say that and why do you refer to people being self-employed not earning as much as employed people as I can assure you that a tattoo artist (who is self-employed earns a lot of money ) but I won't go into my finances with someone I don't know
You say you see people week in and week out on hear asking about moving to Florida well yes this is a forum for advice on moving to other countries etc so I expect you will see that, but you had the luxury of marring or had family there so it would have been a lot easier for you
and as for the( i have to ask myself do you even know what America is ), I'm confused at that bit, we visit different parts of America every year and we would love to settle there and not just because of the weather also because of the people and many other things

RICH

Self employed in USA dont have the benefit of subsidized health insurance for one thing. Your'e smart, don.t need our advise. why are you here? I learned more about tatooists moving to US than I knew yesterday. Lose the attitude, it wont help you with immigration. Good luck.

Markg.uk1

I needed advice pal not being spoken to like I'm a child and I only get wound up when people patronize me, I came on this forum for advice because I don't know the first thing about emigrating, but if being self-employed means you don't get subsidized health insurance then now I know but that wasn't explained to me the lady just said now being self-employed is a different story, and I haven't got attitude I just came for a bit of help which most people gave me

so thank you for explaining, and being told do you even know what America is still has me baffled

Moses2013

I think people have given good advice and never underestimate the move from a low cost area to a high cost area. It can work, but I would highly recommend to watch the programme Goodbye Deutschland and the family Raab opened a tattoo studio in Cape Coral called the Raab Ink Society https://www.raaberyink.com/our-studio
The finances also play a huge part and that amount of money will go very quickly.

christmasoompa

To be fair to steph0scope, I think you've misunderstood what he's said. He didn't say self-employed can't earn as much as employed people, he just meant that if you are employed you usually get healthcare from your employer, whereas if you're self-employed you'll be funding that yourself. And from the figures I've seen on the forum over the years, that will be bloody expensive.

Bottom line is that you've been given info above on visas, and you're going to need to invest a large chunk of money in a business over there and hire USC's to make it happen. It's possible, but you'd need a lot more than your $170k for the house. Unfortunately the US doesn't offer a retirement visa unless you have a large amount of money to 'buy' a green card.

But ignore the advice you don't want, take the advice you do. Think of the forum as a pub, everybody will be chatting and have a different view, you don't have to talk to everybody or agree with them all the time. Start researching, read the Wiki link above, and work out if a visa is feasible or not. You can search the forum for info on health insurance costs, and worry about everything else later if a visa becomes viable and the finances stack up.

Best of luck to you.