That is an interesting perspective and useful insight. Thanks for sharing that.
In every case, that kind of lifestyle is very far away for us. So for now we just have to wait and see what the future holds.

From what he tells me about Malaga, the main selling points are the better weather and the fact they bought a new £400k property that would cost north of £1m in London! I’m sure there are downsides too. I should catch up with them at some point.

Splitting the time between the UK and abroad could work well, indeed. We did it for some time during covid. Here’s what caught me by surprise. Because we couldn’t put roots down in either place, psychologically, this felt a bit unsettling. Kind of living in limbo, but it might be just us!

Malaga is actually our favourite destination too! Would love to hear your friend’s experiences, good and bad and why they chose Malaga themselves.

We also have some friends who moved to Spain over the lockdown so we know it’s not all roses when you start living like a true local.

The key thing for us will be to test it out before making any big moves. Something like part-time living in the UK (summer/spring time and Christmas :), rest abroad could work quite well > doing that, you can still be UK resident and don’t have to worry about the new Brexit restrictions on the EU movement, increase in income taxes and various registrations/bureaucracy, extreme temperatures over summer in hot destinations etc.

But maybe it’s all pipe dream – time will tell :)

Very good point, Ila. I forgot to mention that after so many years living in the UK I may find it harder to adjust. This should be factored in when/if we make a move! There are certain things I am more tolerant of, like queuing. But then I’m less tolerant of rudeness, for instance.

Time will tell I guess! Spain looks similar to Greece. A couple of friends moved to Malaga and have been working remotely!

Spain is probably very similar to Greece in many aspects you mentioned which is why Spain is on our horizon for when we finally FIRE 🤟

There are downsides to living in those places though which may be hard to stomach after many years of living in the UK. So it will be interesting to see who eventually makes the move!