Travel

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FAQ

"How much does traveling cost?"

Cost of living(rent, utilities, wifi, groceries) is $500 USD per month for most countries, $1000 for most others.

"Health care and insurance?"

Health care and insurance are both pennies on the US dollar abroad via medical tourism

"What about visas?"

Usually don't need them, the ones you need are almost all entirely online now, a fifteen minute form and nominal fee that is offset by the drastically lower cost of living in that country.

"How do you make money while abroad?"

Any job that nets you $500 a month works. There are over 2 billion English students globally right now, so native English speakers have lucked into a guaranteed job on or offline.

"What qualifications do I need as an English teacher?"

Some countries and schools require a TEFL certificate or prefer candidates with an associate's degree depending on the position, but if you want to teach English, all you need is to be a fluent English speaker.

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bitofarambler@crazypeople.online

Hey US taxpayers: if you live outside the US 330+ days per year, you don't have to pay federal earned income tax on your first ~126,500 USD each year with IRS form 2555 (infosec.pub)

submitted 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago) by bitofarambler@crazypeople.online to c/bitofarambler@crazypeople.online

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IRS form 2555 qualifies you for the IRS Foreign Earned Income Exclusion, and is a simple form to fill out with the rest of your taxes, takes 5-20 minutes depending on how many countries you lived in that year.

IRS form 2555

IRS instructions

This is the official language of the IRS form 2555 physical presence test:

“You meet the physical presence test if you are physically present in a foreign country or countries 330 full days during any period of 12 consecutive months including some part of the year at issue. The 330 qualifying days do not have to be consecutive.”

Plainly, it doesn’t matter if you were absent from the United States between January 1st and December 31st to qualify, it only matters that you were not present in the United States for 330 of 365 consecutive days that include, in some part, the current tax year.

You could have been in the US until april, and then outside the US from May until the following april, and that’s fine to claim the FEIE and exclude a variable amount of your earned income tax as determined each year by the IRS (currently at $126,500 annually).

By tax year(Jan. 1 - Dec. 31) you were only out of the country for 270 days, but out of 365 calendar days, you were out of the country for 330+ days from May to April, and so you pass the physical presence test, which qualifies you for the Foreign Earned Income Exclusion.

It can be a US or non-US company that employs and pays you, you just have to be physically outside the US.

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[–] skeezix@lemmy.world 3 points 2 days ago (1 children)

What are our expat electronic filing options now that freefillableforms will be gone. If we don't want to use Intuit or other pay software like HR Block. I'd rather just send paper documents instead of supporting those who lobbied to get rid of free options.

[–] bitofarambler@crazypeople.online 1 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago)

Before Direct File was available, there were several private options and sites that could guide filers based on their incomes to free filing programs. It looks like websites are compiling alternatives to Direct file already and many options I'm familiar with from years ago still seem available, including IRS Free File, a separate program I've used before that the IRS developed with private companies to offer free tax filing.

If you don't want anything to do with private companies, you can still get all your tax forms directly from the IRS without prompts and guidance and e-file or paper file your taxes, following the guidance of your previous accepted returns to fill in the next tax year.