The road less traveled

Everyone knows you get what you pay for.   The problem is not knowing  you paid for what you got.

Retirees considering living abroad often begin their search with realtors or organizations paid to sell certain information, developments, or areas.  While those services have their place, retirees are best served by learning an area organically, by experiencing it as an informed visitor, through a network of friends that includes locals and expats … before realtors or developers.

Changes In Latitude invites you to skip the conferences and tours guided by the hope for a commission.  Explore one of Latin America’s most amazing communities undercover as our guest. Meet locals. Stay in little-known countryside destinations instead of mega-resorts hosting conferences.

We live in C. America and know the region well.  We also know many retirees who have returned home after living here. We have watched too many jump-in as expats on the wrong foot based on hype.  We enjoy sharing our community… the good, the bad and the ugly.

Changes In Latitude has no agenda other than introducing retirees to the local lifestyle gently. Our role is simple, we are travel consultants who love making new friends, cooking for our guests, and helping others take “the road less traveled”.  Our fees are upfront and depend on your itinerary as we provide both guide services and self-guided itineraries. Often we provide a combination of both.

We never accept commissions, not even from hotels or airlines. We never accept incentive payments of any kind. We do not represent a single development. Check our website and click on “acclaim” for our references.

Recent retirement tour groups have ranged in size from six to as little as one.  For more information, write: info@ChangesInLatitude.org or call (507) 6966.2691.

Many of the reasons for becoming an expatriot in retirement are easy to guess.  Climate, culture, cost-of-living, and adventure are common reasons for becoming an expat.  What about creativity?   A new study has proven that living in a foreign country increases creativity.

In negotiation exercises given to 200 people, none could make a deal when neither had lived abroad.  When both individuals had lived abroad, 70% find a way to negotiate a mutually satisfactory outcome!  This study was conducted by the Kellogg School of Management in Chicago and the INSEA, a business school in Fontainebleau, France.  Yes, the researchers conducted a cross check to make sure that it wasn’t a case of the most creative people choosing to live as expats.

A quick look into the lives of your favorite authors, painters, and artists tells you that many of them lived as expats at some point in their lives.  We now know for a fact that this experience increased their psychological creativity.  The initial France/USA study found that 60% of students with expatriot experience solved a problem that only 42% of students without foreign experience solved, which led to the negotiation excercise study.  But these students actually lived abroad; simply traveling abroad is not enough.

The moral of this story is simple.  Live abroad and you can increase your creativity.  (Source:  Journal of Personality & Social Psychology, W. Maddux & A. Galinsky.)  You will learn a new culture, language, cuisine, music, and social situations.  Your brain will rewire itself for your long-term advantage.  Gauguin painted in Panama before heading to Tahiti.  Hemingway often wrote from Cuba.  Where is your “place in the sun”?