People often ask why we moved to Mexico. The question always seems funny to me, sort of like, “Why do you want to live in Paradise?”
But some people are afraid of Mexico and imagine dire poverty, filth, and drug crime violence. The truth lies closer to the Paradise side of things, and all places have their problems.
Some of you wonder if there’s a way to leave the rat race behind in favor of a more peaceful, creative way to live.
You may have an idea to make money using the Internet, but wonder if that’s realistic. I’m telling this story here and you can make up your own minds about how to do this for yourself. It may be much more possible than you think!
In 2002 we fell in love with Ajijic, Mexico, and bought a beautiful house in the village. At that time, it was our intention to return to the US where we both had businesses and jobs, work like heck for the next 4-7 years before retiring and coming to live here. But that didn’t happen. We were too impatient.
Somehow, getting back into a 70-mile commute to an office full of bureaucratic delays had less appeal to me once we were back home. My husband took one look at me, saw the fatigue and the boredom, and suggested we take off for Mexico as soon as possible.
It was just after the dot-com bubble burst and funding for our other two companies (Razer, Mind-FX Science) was at an all-time low. I was already in my late 50s, and the hubby was already claiming his paltry social security at 62 years of age. How could we manage an early retirement?
We weren’t sure how we’d have enough to live on, but we’d have plenty of move-n-start-over money once we sold our two US homes, our stocks, and quit all of our state-side activities. With the Internet, and the web-based businesses we held onto, we figured we’d find a way to generate enough.
We had no idea how, or even if this was realistic.
I know that many people are raising questions about the future and how they are going to retire given the decrease in assets, savings, retirement funds and the economic downturn. Sometimes the way isn’t clear until you decide to “just do it.” Leap and the net will appear.
I know that’s scary. But you can’t always plan everything out and then decide. First you have to want it. Then you decide to just do it. The thrill of an adventure and change must appeal to you far more than the dread of doing the same-old things day after day with little real hope for a fun future.
The details will appear later. The ‘how’ appears after the ‘what.’ That’s just how it is.
For us, the “what” was like this:
- Travel to Ajijic, Mexico, look at houses
- Buy a house (pay for it in cash)
- Go back, sell everything, pack up, move
The “how” turned out like this:
- Get computers set up in house with DSL connections plus wireless
- Get phone set up through VOIP with US phone number
- Get rid of all exterior office-based work in favor of Internet-based businesses
- Set up websites and blogs and Kick Start Cart e-commerce system
Social security is a great system, and many people here can live in Mexico on nothing else. Many people are now facing diminished retirement funds.
I don’t know how anyone can live on just Social Security in the US, but then I’m from California where the cost of living is high. Even in other states, I still don’t know how people live on social security alone, it’s gotta be hard.
The Internet is a great opportunity to generate additional income. How can you package your expertise into an Internet-based business? What do you know that people would pay to learn?
If you’re interested in learning more about how you can do this, I offer consulting services to help plan online content marketing with blogs and other tools. You don’t have to be a computer geek anymore to make a living online. You do have to be smart at what you do and know, and love helping other people.
Call me: (US number rings in Mexico): 858-375-5048
P.S. Life is ironic, because just after moving here in 2003, one of my husband’s companies, Razer, got funded and really took off. It’s now huge, a leading provider of computer hardware and accessories for the PC gamer community. My own work as The Blog Squad got really popular, and we returned to the US to work for 4 years. We’ve now been back in Mexico for 16 months, once again semi-retired and loving it. Life is good…
Recent Comments