Barry had it narrowed down to two cities.

Charlotte, North Carolina. Or Raleigh, North Carolina.

He worked from the internet. He could live anywhere. So he visited both.

Homeless people on benches. Needles on the ground. An environment he had no interest in calling home. He got back in the car and started looking elsewhere.

A few months of research later he was living in McKinley Hill, BGC with a full skyline view for $800 a month including utilities.

Barry ran the math on what moving to Charlotte actually looked like.

A decent apartment in the city — $1,500 per month. Car — $300 per month. Insurance — $150. Gas. Groceries. Going out occasionally. Dating.

He kept landing at $2,500 per month minimum. For a restricted lifestyle. Car-dependent. Unremarkable. He even remembered taking a girl out to a local breakfast spot back home — two plates of bacon and eggs — and the bill came to $50.

BGC changed every number in that equation.

Studio apartment in McKinley Hill. Full skyline view. Utilities included. Lives directly above Venice Mall — gym downstairs, groceries downstairs, restaurants downstairs. He walks everywhere. No car. No insurance. No gas.

Total monthly spend — around $2,000. That includes eating out regularly, going to nice restaurants with his girlfriend a few times a week, and a lifestyle he describes with one word.

Unrestricted.

The lifestyle he has now in BGC — the view, the freedom, the dining, the ability to book a flight to Palawan for under $100 when he wants a beach — would have cost $10,000 per month in Charlotte by his own estimate.

Not because he is extravagant. Because that is simply what unrestricted costs in America.

Here it costs $2,000.

The numbers were the reason Barry came. What kept him here was everything else.

The people greet you in the hallway. The security guard knows your name by week two. You walk past someone on the street and they say hi — something that used to be normal in America and quietly disappeared. His girlfriend took him to a nice restaurant for a date and the bill was $20. She said thank you like he had done something extraordinary.

He had never felt less invisible.

BGC is not just cheaper than Charlotte. It is cleaner. It is safer. It is more walkable. And it is full of people who are genuinely warm in a way that most Americans stopped expecting from strangers a long time ago.

Barry is not a retiree. He is not on a pension. He is just someone who ran the numbers on two cities, did not like what he saw in America, and made a decision.

If you work from the internet the math is even simpler. You are already paying for a lifestyle in the States that costs three times more and gives you half the life. The only thing standing between you and BGC is the decision to look.

We have helped over 105 people make that decision — from the rental negotiation to the visa to the bank account. Every single one of them will tell you the same thing.

The research phase ends the moment you get on a call.

Click here to start your move to the Philippines the right way

Travel Well,

Evan Lorezca

The Savvy Expat