Top 15 European Countries for American Expats in 2026. [Survey Results]

Wondering which are the best European countries for American expats in 2026? In this season finale, we’re breaking down the InterNations' 2025 Expat Insider Survey—a massive study of over 10,000 expats across 46 countries—to uncover which European nations are delivering for expats. We focus only on the top and bottom 15 European countries overall and across these critical categories: Working Abroad, Personal Finance, Quality of Life, Expat Essentials, Ease of Settling In, and the General Happiness factor.

The data reveals unexpected winners: Spain dominates quality of life rankings while Cyprus quietly claims spots in both the top 15 overall (#14) and happiness rankings (#6). Austria surprises at #4 for quality of life despite its reputation for unfriendly locals. Ireland leads Europe for working abroad, followed by the Netherlands, while Portugal and Spain stand out for personal finance. Other top 15 countries included Denmark, Norway, Belgium, and more!

Hear Jeffrey’s analysis of how Emily in Paris is a great story of an American confronting and accepting life abroad and his theory about how €2 beers are likely fueling Spanish happiness scores.

Join us for this wide-ranging conversation on expat life and what the data reveals!

Timestamps:

00:00 Welcome to the finale of Season 1! 
00:31 Introduction to first filmed edition 
1:35 Expat Insider Survey background and topics 
9:38 European rankings and how LAA selects countries 
23:50 Potential bias in survey participants 
27:41 What's next for LAA and the podcast

Get the InterNations Expat Insider 2025 report we discuss in this episode here.

Go to our YouTube channel to see the visuals we discuss in this episode.

Join our How to Move to Europe: Visa Basics for US Citizens course at www.livingabroadacademy.com/learn. Learn everything from visa and resident permit types and requirements to typical application costs and timelines. Bonus planning documents and interactive worksheets included! 

SPECIAL OFFER - Spend a couple of hours learning how Americans can move to Europe, including details like legal requirements, typical time required and costs. Join the How to Move to Europe online course at LivingAbroadAcademy.com/Learn. For a limited time, podcast listeners save $40! Now $39 using the code PODCAST at checkout, reg. $79.

Learn more about how The Living Abroad Academy informs and accelerates moves to Europe for Americans: www.livingabroadacademy.com

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Transcript

Michelle  00:08 

Welcome to our final episode of season one of Experts and Expats. We published our first episode on December 18, 2024 and wow. What a year it has been. Jeffrey? 

Jeffrey  00:22 

For sure. It's been a big year.  

Michelle  00:24 

Yeah.  

Jeffrey  00:25 

-lots of changes and adaptations and yeah. 

Michelle  00:28 

Pivoting, yep,  

Jeffrey  00:29 

Yep. 

Michelle  00:30 

This episode is also going to be our first video edition of the Experts in Expats podcast. We're not entirely camera shy, but we had some technical difficulties, so we're- we've got a YouTube channel going, but so far, we've only been putting our audio episodes up on YouTube, and so we want to start posting the video versions of those of the interviews going forward, so we'll see how that works out. If you are listening via a podcast platform, just know that we will have some graphics that we'll- we'll be sharing today and discussing regarding this Expat Insiders report from InterNations. So if you want to see the visuals, go on over to YouTube, look for the link in the episodes- this episode's description, and be sure to follow us over there on YouTube and like us if you find it of value, and if you haven't followed us yet on the podcast platform that you're in, go ahead and do that so that you get it served up for you every time we have a new episode. We're gonna do this episode a little differently. Um, you've been- if you've been listening, you know that our previous episode- in the previous episode, we interviewed the good people at InterNations, which is an expat community platform that has chapters in over 142 cities across the globe. 

Jeffrey  01:56 

Yeah, that's right, so many cities. Every year, InterNations does a survey of expats to rank expat destinations, so we thought it would be a great way to end the year to review their what they call 2025 Expert Insider survey together. So one thing we wanted to highlight today was the Expat Insider Survey, which is conducted every year in February. You can find that on the InterNations website, and just know that it covers the entire world. But we'll be discussing the most interesting aspects of what it reveals about Europe today. So over 10,000 expats participated in the survey. They represented 172 nationalities living in countries or territories worldwide. It's worth noting that the most common nationality participating were US citizens. Expats included those from the InterNations community, but it was also promoted elsewhere. So it wasn't just InterNations expats. 

Michelle  2:52 

Yeah, and I thought that the demographics of the expats were revealing. Here, you can see on the screen- we're showing slides, the gender split is even it's 50/50. Half male, half female. 55% were in a relationship, but over 80% were without children. So, I mean, I think that that speaks to- I'm reading that as- that these are people who are there to work, and when you when we get to the top 15 overall ranking, like, there's a lot of countries on there that, like, are not popular with the US.  

Jeffrey  3:27 

Yes, yes. 

Michelle  3:28 

But I think that the people that are there are probably- it's like, you know, oil and gas people, it's diplomats. It's like, people going to work for these major corporations that are in those countries. So it's not specifically our demographics. So when you see the age splits here, then too, the majority of the expats are in those working years. Only 19% of them were retired. So 76% had a degree. 42% of them had master's degrees. So considering that one of the major categories covered is working abroad, all of the subcategories are related to employment. So I'm going to say the majority of the expats are probably coming from that perspective. And this makes sense, because the founders of InterNations were in that demographic. That is exactly why they created InterNations. You know, based on their lives as employees who worked in foreign countries. So I just want to point out that the survey doesn't cover anything related to being self-employed or running your own business in a foreign country, but otherwise, all the topics covered still relate. 

Jeffrey  4:36 

For a country be listed and ranked, at least 50 survey participants per destination were required. In 2025, 46 destinations met this requirement. Participants were asked to rate up to 53 factors related to expat life on a scale of one to seven. The survey emphasized personal satisfaction with these factors considered both factual, for instance, housing costs and emotional- like feeling at home or having that pull we talked about- those aspects with equal weight. And that's a- that's a great balance we think. The individual factor ratings were grouped into 16 subcategories under five general topics plus responses to the question: "all things considered, how happy were you with your life abroad in general?" 

Michelle  5:18 

So, now we just want to go through all the topics and categories real quick. So, if you go to the next slide. Jeffrey, Because they're a really great lists of things to consider when you're thinking about moving abroad. They're fairly broad, but I think they are a good first place to look when you're trying to come up with a short list of places. So, the top one is Quality of Life, and underneath that, the subcategories are Travel andTransit like if you don't have that, your quality of life is going to suffer. Environment and Climate, Leisure Options, Healthcare, and Safety and Security are all under that Quality of Life tag. The Ease of Settling In is another major category. So that relates to how friendly are the locals, how easy or hard it is to find friends, and then how easy is the culture, and how welcoming is the culture or the people there. And then Working Abroad is related to career prospects, salary and job security, work and leisure, work culture and satisfaction. And I think this is a good place for us to- to kind of, I don't know that we've ever said this, but in the making of the course that we did, we see our audience as the people who want to move abroad independently. So, that means not through getting hired at a company, not going over there as an employee, and then also not going over there by marrying a local either. Because those two ways 

Jeffrey  6:46 

You're very independent, right? 

Michelle  6:49 

Yeah, it's- it's about the independence of being able to go on your own, you know, fuel, basically not being dependent on an employer or a spouse to be able to get the ability to live there. And then there's Expat Essentials, so Digital Life, how much do they do- 

Jeffrey  7:08 

What does that mean? Can we ask what Digital Life means? That's such a funny like, I mean, does that just mean, like, the you know, the ability to be online? 

Michelle  7:13 

No it means that- like, how hard is it to do life digitally or not? Some countries are very still paper-focused. They're not- they don't have online forms. You know the- you have to go into the office and wait in line, or you have to make an appointment. You can't just do stuff online.  

Jeffrey  7:33 

Do a lot of things online, like- like Estonia, that's incredible. Or, you know, some kind of, yes, 

Michelle  7:38 

Yeah, yeah. So, other Expat Essentials are Admin Topics, Housing ,and Language, and then Personal Finance. Like, how- how rich or poor do you feel? 

Jeffrey  7:50 

I was gonna ask, what does that mean? Is it easy to get a bank account or, yeah, I mean, 

Michelle  7:55 

It's more about, like, how, how far does your dollar go- or how well do your personal finance survive over there? Like, like, it's the difference between Türkiye and Spain. I think, like, inflation wise, what do things cost, all of that. And then their final question was: "how happy are you with your life abroad in general?" So that speaks to the sort of general happiness factor. 

Jeffrey  8:20 

This is a great set of items. And I- do you think any- is there anything else you would add to that, Michelle? I think that's a pretty good coverage. 

Michelle  8:27 

I think everything is pretty much covered there. What is not covered is if you're self-employed or running a business, right? So, like I said, this is coming from the perspective of those founders who were employees. So, they're, they really kind of come from that lens of this: you're- you're hired, you know, you're an employee. You're being sent to a new country. How well are you adapting there? What is your quality of life? Like my nephew just got transferred to London. He- they're- they've been in North Carolina. The whole family's going to move to London. So, he would be a great, you know, candidate for- he fits into their demographics. I like it because we can fit it- we're going to only talk about the European countries that are on in this report, but it's through this focus, like, I like how they're focusing it. 

Jeffrey  9:16 

Absolutely. You know, there are- there is career prospects there, which, you know, we know there's people that, my gosh, that's very brave to move without a job, and go to a country and look for a job, and there are people that try to work locally. I tried a little bit. So they- considering that to a degree, but maybe not to be a digital nomad, but-  

Michelle  9:34 

Yeah 

Jeffrey  9:35 

to get a job there. Yeah,  

Michelle  9:37 

Yeah 

Jeffrey  9:37 

Interesting. 

Michelle  9:38 

So, now we're going to move on to discussing all the survey results as it relates to the European countries only. We're not going to get into Saudi Arabia and some of the other countries that are there, But we want to explain something first, that we at the Living Abroad Academy and through our courses, we are currently only focusing on 22 countries in Europe. It includes countries that are in the EU and out of the EU, and it does not include all of the countries in the EU. We just focused on them because they are the countries that we know, and we- that we know are popular. So, what happens in InterNations is that they are talking about a country that we do not cover in our courses, so we're not going to talk about that, and that country is Luxembourg. So, we decided early on that we wanted to promote countries that met our demographics of US citizens who want to emigrate on their own, you know, not through the employer or marriage base, and they also had to meet these general requirements. So, let's go to the next slide and show the 22 countries. These are the countries that we do cover, and you'll see all of them are, for the most part, in Western, Northern and Southern Europe. But there is a country in the middle of all of that, which is Luxembourg, and we do not cover that one. But the other general requirements that we wanted all the countries that we cover at LAA are based on these general requirements, which is the ease of immigrating, affordability, safety, stability, and popularity. So, they- they cover most of what the InterNations is covering. But I think the stability and popularity is not in the InterNations reporting. So, we just wanted to point that out. 

Jeffrey  11:22 

Yeah, we have our own metrics show how, you know, we devise stability and populating too, that we'll get into in the course.  

Michelle  11:28 

Yeah. And so based on this criteria, and the 22 countries, you know, Luxembourg was not on that list, neither of us know much about it. It's not a popular country to go to. We don't think it's that affordable either or popular for US citizens. We might add it later, but for now, we're ignoring it. And, you know, like we included Switzerland on our list, but I think, you know, I- if I were redoing that list, I don't know that I would leave that on there, because it's there's not affordable pathways there. Very limited pathways, I would say. So- but I think it's a popular place people would love to go to, and so I think it- we kept it on there to kind of show there are very limited ways to go to Switzerland, but if you are in that category, we have the information for it.  

Jeffrey  12:17 

Okay, so let's get into the overall rankings. There's 46 countries ranked in order of how expats answer the questions. InterNations has a very lengthy review of the data, and they've talked- how many slides was that? Was like over a hundre slides? 

Michelle  12:31 

It was a- it was 185 pages. That's how many, that's the full report. 

Jeffrey  12:38 

That's a lot of data.  

Michelle  12:38 

It's a lot. Yeah. 

Jeffrey  12:39 

Yeah. It was a lengthy review of the data, and they talked about them in terms of top 15 and bottom 15 in relation to countries, right? Along with commentary on the trends and especially countries that move up or down the list over the past year. So for audio listeners, we'll focus on the top 15 and the bottom 15. So, let's start with the top 15. What's a little surprising about the top 15 is there's only one European country there, Spain, which came in number nine. So being a new Spanish resident, I'm really happy to see that, and I can say from my personal experiences, it's been a really positive place on- on so many levels. So I'm glad other people feel that way. 

Michelle  13:20 

This is the overall ranking. So, out of all of the five categories that they had people talk about this is where these countries came up, one to 46, right? On their list. 

Jeffrey  13:33 

Right. I mean, there's countries there, you know, as a female, as a as a person from the gay community, or just somebody, if you like human rights, human dignity at certain levels. Some of those countries are not going to resonate with you, but, you know, but there's- people have different, you know, people have different priorities and tastes, places they like. 

Michelle  13:53 

Yeah, and like, if you're an employee, you don't have a choice, like, whether you're going there or not. So, Panama- Panama was number one. And, you know, actually the top three, Panama, Colombia, Mexico, are all Latin America. And then the next, number four and five is Thailand and Vietnam. Number six is China. Number seven is the UAE. Eight is Indonesia. And then Spain comes in at nine. And then the rest are Malaysia, Oman, Saudi Arabia, Philippines, Cyprus, actually, Cyprus is another European country that we do cover, and they were number 14, and then Brazil comes in at 15. So there's a lot of countries on here that we don't talk about. We don't we- we've, like, both of us have, kind of, like, decided against Latin America. I've pretty much said no to most of Asia, like Southeast Asia. For now, at least. You know, Thailand is still kind of a question mark for me, but yeah, you can see overall rankings, like Europe didn't fare very- very well on the top 15. 

Jeffrey  15:00 

No. And that's very interesting. It shows you that people have different priorities. I wonder, you know, because you said a lot of people in InterNations, they're, you know, they're with a company, and they're transfer- 

Michelle  15:09 

Yeah 

Jeffrey  15:09 

It may have something to do with that [unitelligible} but it probably has a lot to do with that. You know, Colombia, I have Colombian family members, and some people- Medellin. I- was it this year? Was ranked as one of the hippest and nicest cities. Well, you know, let me take that back. They have one of the hippest neighborhoods in the world, and it's a very popular expat city. So, you know, there's good things happening there.  

Michelle  15:36 

Yeah  

Jeffrey  15:36 

There's some- there's some- I have a friend in- where is she now? She's in Vietnam. Is that's there, right? Yeah, she loves it. She's there writing a book. She's like, this is what I needed. And, you know, everybody needs some different medicine. People will have a different connection with countries.  

Michelle  15:52 

Yeah, yeah. And I was in Mexico for a month this year.  

Jeffrey  15:55 

That's right  

Michelle  15:55 

I went down. I was in Mexico City for a little bit, which is far too polluted for me, for too crowd. It was hot too, I went like, in April. So, and then I went and spent a month in San Miguel de Allende. And it was lovely. It was totally lovely. But I just can't help, like, reading about, like, all the murders that are happening on the way from the airport to the town, and, like, in the outskirts of town. And I can't live in the murder capital of the world. I just can't. 

Jeffrey  16:26 

Mexico is such a beautiful, just stunning culture, and- and, but when it's like, when things go wrong, they can really go wrong. 

Michelle  16:35 

Yeah, and you'd never know right, because it's just gangs. It's just gangs. I think it's the next slide now.  

Jeffrey  16:43 

Yeah. The lower- the lower 15  

Michelle  16:45 

Yeah. What was equally surprising was that the number of European countries that were in the bottom 15, so seven out of 15, that's almost half of the list was Europe. So in the order that they appear, Greece was at number 34 and that's only two slots above the US- US was at 36. And so remember, too that this survey was done in February of 2025 so I would imagine the 2026, version is going to tell a very different story about the US. So it'll be interesting to see. Then the next European country is Italy at 37. 38 is Sweden. 39 is Norway. 41 is the UK. I mean, the UK for me, personally, I would never recommend anyone moving there 

Jeffrey  17:36 

They're not moving in a good direction right now. Are they? It's so sad 

Michelle  17:38 

No, they're like they're like Türkiye. It's they're like Türkiye. They're 10 years ahead of the US. They wrecked their economy in 2016 and they their freedom of speech is, like, non-existent, almost. I mean, it's a lot of stuff going on there 

Jeffrey  17:50 

It's a tough time. It's a lovely country, so 

Michelle  17:52 

Yeah. 42 is Germany. 43 is Finland. And then that's- yeah. So that's seven out of 15. Yeah, yeah, Türkiye. And Kuwait is the one at the bottom, 46 

Jeffrey  18:05 

Well, Kuwait made the list. That's interesting. Yeah. 

Michelle  18:07 

Yeah, right? So that means that- I think that's oil and gas, right? That's gotta be oil and gas people,. 

Jeffrey  18:13 

Yeah, for sure. Yeah.  

Michelle  18:15 

So while European countries didn't fare well in the overall ranking, they did much better for some of the five topics and for the happiness level. So we're going to look at each of these category- five- top five categories, and discuss only the top 15. So the full report goes into much more depth. You know, you can go to InterNations.org, to find the report yourself. So let's just go through top category- first category is quality of life. 

Jeffrey  18:46 

Quality of life, there's Spain, and it is pretty nice here. So that's not surprising. 

Michelle  18:50 

Spain is number one, right? Let's= because people are watching or listening on the podcast. They don't, they can't see this. So Spain is number one for quality of life. So even though it only was at- where was it in the overall ranking? Did it make it into the overall ranking? 

Jeffrey  19:05 

it's number nine. See to the left there, number nine.  

Michelle  19:08 

Right. Okay, right, that's right. Yeah, I'm having a hard time seeing that. So yeah, that's pretty great.  

Jeffrey  19:14 

Yeah.  

Michelle  19:16 

All right. So Austria number four. Luxembourg is number five, actually,  

Jeffrey  19:24 

Oh yeah, there it is. 

Michelle  19:28 

but then Portugal's at number 10, Switzerland's at 11, France is at 12, Denmark is at 13. So this is a really interesting quality- I mean, quality of life is you can't, like, get more important than that. 

Jeffrey  19:41 

It's interesting. Austria is there at four. And, you know, people say it's beautiful, right? I mean, but is it six? No, it's four.  

Michelle  19:50 

Yeah 

Jeffrey  19:50 

for quality of life. And, you know, you hear a lot that people don't feel like the locals are friendly. And there's a little bit,  

Michelle  19:58 

Yeah, yeah 

Jeffrey  19:58 

but- but it made four overall, and that's really interesting. I would expect France to be there. So that's France is down at 12. 

Michelle  20:06 

Yeah, yeah, it's- it's interesting to see that Europe did so poorly in the overall but in quality of life, they did pretty well. Ease of settling in is the next category, and not so great here. We got Cyprus at number 10 and then Spain at number 13 and Greece at 14. That's not great. 

Jeffrey  20:35 

No, no that's not a- and I will say that it is, you know, I think ease of settling in. That's such a tough- because, you know, how friendly are people, how- willingness, how easy- is somebody working with you at the bank in your language? There's too many aspects to that, and not completely easy here in Spain, just speaking right now. Depends on where you are. I think Catalonia is a little tougher than some other areas But, yeah,  

Michelle  21:04 

Yeah. So then working abroad is the next category, and Ireland is pretty top there. Well, Ireland has a lot of American companies now, like hiding out and not paying taxes, so a lot of transfers for like Facebook and Amazon and Google, blah, blah, blah. Netherlands is number four for working abroad. That was interesting.  

Jeffrey  21:23 

Finland number six,  

Jeffrey  21:26 

Belgium, number eight, Norway, number 12. My, you always imagine Norway- I don't know, like a utopia. So,  

Michelle  21:35 

Yeah,  

Jeffrey  21:36 

Austria, 15. Well, these all made the list. This is a great list.  

Michelle 21:39 

Yeah,  

Jeffrey  21:39 

Some were on the list- it's Austria is down now. Interesting. Austria was so high on overall quality of life, but is at 15 for working abroad. Interesting,  

Michelle  21:48 

Yeah, but it made the list for 15, like there's  

Jeffrey  21:50 

That's right, That's a big deal.  

Michelle  21:52 

30/31, that didn't make it at all.So.  

Jeffrey  21:56 

Alright, personal finance. We have Spain at number 11 and Portugal at number 12. What did we say that was earlier? Personal finance. 

Michelle  22:04 

Well, that's just how your-  How are your finances? So is it hard to live there financially? Is it easy?  

Jeffrey  22:11 

Yeah, yeah.  

Michelle  22:12 

So that speaks to their southern European you know, economy,  

Jeffrey  22:16 

Yes, yeah, yeah. You can do a lot with your money now it's- it's getting less pleasant by the day, but 

Michelle  22:23 

Yeah. Well Vietnam is number one for personal finance, and I was thinking it was either between Vietnam and Türkiye, when I was like, I lost my contract. I need to go hang out and be cheap somewhere. 

Jeffrey  22:34 

Well, that's interesting. My friend that is there now, I think she's a little burned out on how expensive everything is in the US, and she's loving it. And you know, you get that feeling. I went to- was it Guatemala- 20 years ago, and I felt like, my gosh, I can do anything I want. Like, you have that feeling like-, like you're not strained at all. Yeah,  

Michelle  22:52 

Yes. And I think that's what that personal finance is about. It's like, how far is your money going right? Expat essentials, is the next category? 

Jeffrey  23:03 

Just Luxembourg?  I don't think there's anything highlighted on this for us. I'm gonna try Nope. Nothing there. Just Luxembourg 

Michelle  23:09 

Yeah. Nothing on the- No European country made the list top 15 for expat essentials, interesting. Happiness level. Spain came in 

Jeffrey  23:24 

at four. Yeah, 

Michelle  23:26 

yeah. Cyprus is at six.  

Jeffrey  23:29 

Six. There we go. Portugal. I think that's it. 

Michelle  23:35 

Yeah.  

Jeffrey  23:35 

And, you know, I think that two euro beers have a lot to do with the happiness in Spain. That's- there's other reasons. That's the English. That's why the English likes Spain, no.  

Michelle  23:49 

Yeah.  

Jeffrey  23:50 

Anyway, yeah, great list. It's nice to see it broke down like this. 

Michelle  23:54 

Yeah. You know, and I can see, like, down the road, you know, if we've- we've built a big enough audience that we can do our own survey, right?  

Jeffrey  24:05 

I'd love- that'd be great. 

Michelle  24:05 

For the independent because I think- I think that is really skewed towards the people who actually have jobs there. You know that have been transferred is through work. So that's a very different- it's such a different way of going to a new country, because you still have the culture of your work. You've been taken care of. Usually, they've moved you there. They're setting up your housing, and they're doing all this stuff for you. So that's a very different experience from someone who's just going to pick up and go to a new country and has to kind of find their way themselves, or hire an expert, 

Jeffrey  24:37 

Absolutely, you get a lot of support. Yeah, we were, you know, it's the Emily in Paris thing, right? You go. Nobody likes you, but you still have your friends back in the US, you know, you still have your company to supporting you. You could apply a little pressure to from the US to get them to work with you. And, you know, they're always scared. I don't know, you know, I'm gonna get into- often times I've lived it. They're scared of the American like, you know, "oh my gosh, what's he doing?"  

Michelle  25:01 

Sorry, I was hung up on the Emily in Paris reference. I've never seen that. So she was, did she go by an employer? 

Jeffrey  25:10 

This is very important cultural knowledge, Michelle. No, it's not. But anyway, she- she- so her boss was going to go to the Paris- they acquired this, this agency in Paris, this ad agency in France, snd the American brand acquired, it. So the boss, her boss, was going to go work with the office, you know, to kind of bring in American ideas and work with them. Well, the boss, surprisingly becomes pregnant, and so Emily, her employee, ends up going in her place. And she's from Chicago. She's all about Chicago and they're like you, they're calling her a hick, la pluck, and they're calling her a hick and, and, you know, you don't know anything about luxury. She's a social media genius, and gradually they realize "oh no, she's a genius." I think we've lived that too, right? Of being the digital oddball, but, uh.  

Michelle  26:03 

Right, right. 

Jeffrey  26:04 

So really, you know what- what is- what relates to this is that, no, you are, you are a cultural oddball when you go somewhere else, and you know you may never. And she realizes, well, I'm never going to fit in, but I can enjoy it. I'm- just get in the mindset that I don't need to disappear into this culture. I will always be an American, but I will be respectful. I will learn some language. I will learn how to order food. I will learn how to do a lot of things that are polite. 

Michelle  26:28 

Yeah, yeah. And I think that that's the difference of like, the person who actually is all-in on the culture, wants to go there, wants to retire there, wants to die there, you know, as opposed to the person who's just like, I'm on an adventure, I want to go do this. I'm in the stage of my life where I can do this. I want to go do this. Who knows if I'm really that committed to staying until the bitter end? Like.  

Jeffrey  26:52 

Right? Yeah.  

Michelle  26:53 

And so like, it's the difference between, like, do you get citizenship or not? Like, because a lot of these countries have a pathway to citizenship and like, those criteria has- those requirements have started changing now in Europe too. I mean, France actually has, just now the level of language skills that you have to have to get citizenship to like, I think it's C1 now? Maybe? I don't know, they upped it like, it's harder- like, and it's hard to learn French, you know? 

Jeffrey  27:22 

Oh it is. And we know we will never speak well enough, but maybe well enough for their exam. You know? I don't know. There's something like that in Italy too. That's there's a point system where you can if you speak- Anyway. It's a different path, 

Michelle  27:35 

Yeah, well, that kind of takes us to the end here.  

Jeffrey  27:40 

Let's stop there.  

Michelle  27:41 

We are- This is going to be our final episode of 2025 

Jeffrey  27:49 

Yes. A little tear in our eye. Our first season  

Michelle  27:51 

Season- season one, right, which actually might happen in January. Who knows?  

Jeffrey  27:55 

Yes, exactly.  

Michelle  27:58 

We're hard at work at the course. We're going to be launching that soon, and then we are already starting to fill our calendar for the season two episodes. We've got someone from Croatia already lined up, and we're working on teeing up a financial advisor so it would be someone who could cover all of the taxes and income requirement, or all of the things related to how to do your taxes and stuff abroad. So that would be not country specific, but very expat life specific. 

Jeffrey  28:36 

Yes. And I know also he's going to speak to this, you know, how to set up residency in a state how to- yeah, again, also mitigating these challenges with currency. It's a very important subject, and you don't really realize how important it is when you decide to become an expat. So it's great to have an expert in your corner for that. You know, I just wanted to take a moment and thank everyone for- for just the incredible- the incredible amount of listens that you're following us, and you're listening and our-  our- what is the word listenership, our audience has just exploded, and just, we're really thankful for that, and just your enthusiasm about not only being an expat, but supporting us.  

Michelle  29:18 

And you know, if you go to our website, I think it is on the podcast page, the overview of the podcast where there's a link to say, tell us what you want to hear about. Is there a country you want to hear about? Is there a topic that you want to hear about? Like, one of the round tables we talked about doing was maybe health care in different countries. What have- what are some of these expats experience with their health care systems in their country? The other one was driving, you know, because John and Tara talked about like, how hard it is, almost impossible to get a driver's license in Italy. So it's a very difficult situation that if you can't pass the driver's test, you can't drive there. And if you're living in a rural part, you're driving illegally, and if they catch you, they will kick you out of the country. So it's- I thought that would be an interesting topic to talk about all the different country- people in different countries, and their experience with driving and- and, you know, I think if you're living in the bigger cities, there is great transportation in a lot of European cities, but if you are living more rural, you do have to have a car.  

Jeffrey  30:24 

Absolutely. Yeah, it's, I think, a $500 process here in Spain to get a license. And they say the test is so difficult the most people, Spanish people that have a license couldn't pass it again, 

Michelle  30:36 

Well, in the Netherlands, I heard it was 2000 bucks.  

Jeffrey  30:39 

Oh my-  

Michelle  30:39 

just to get,  

Jeffrey  30:40 

No it's crazy.  

Michelle  30:45 

Yeah, all right, yeah, so again, thank you to everyone who's listening.  

Jeffrey  30:51 

Thank you, yeah, thank you. 

Michelle  30:52 

We super appreciate it, and we will see you in the new year. 

Jeffrey  30:58 

Yeah, happy New Year. Happy 2026. Sure you'll be listening to this in 2026. Have a great year.  

Michelle  31:04 

Yeah.