The International Living Guide to Retiring Overseas on a Budget: How to Live Well on $25,000 a Year

INTRODUCTIONWhat if you could retire better, more affordably, and even earlier than you expected?

WHEN WE LEFT OMAHA IN 2001 to work as editors for International Living magazine in Quito, Ecuador, this idea—that you could live better for less in an overseas locale that closely matched your idea of paradise—was relatively novel. We could pretty much count all the “gringos” living in Ecuador at the time on one hand. Two or three in Cuenca, a handful in Vilcabamba, another handful in Otavalo. Most of the expats in Ecuador lived in Quito and were associated with the petroleum industry. Only a few were baby boomer “retirees.”

But over the years, we’ve met more and more people who’ve done what we have.

They’ve left the rat race of the workaday world behind and relocated to places like Ecuador, Panama, Costa Rica, Mexico, Spain, Malaysia, and more . . . with warmer weather, a better quality of life, less crime, more cultural activities, healthier and less expensive food, better and less expensive health care . . . and they’re enjoying every bit of it for about $2,000 a month or less, all in. Many of them aren’t even of “official” retirement age.

Ron and Terresa Moore, for example, have been retired in Ecuador since 2009—long enough for Ron’s ponytail to grow all the way down his back. In 2008, though, when Ron was 54 and Terresa was 50, they were struggling. They’d lost a third of their nest egg and were so close to losing their home that all they could do was walk away.

Today they ...