Is moving to Puerto Rico a good idea?

First off, welcome to the forum and hopefully Puerto Rico.
I was born in PR and lived there until age 20, then I came to the states and been here for 43 years. I plan to return back to PR in 2018 and I already purchased a plot of land to build my home.

Jobs are hard to come by and pay in around 1/2 of what it would be in the state. Most crime is dru related, there is rarely a hurt innocent bystander. The rest are either crimes of passion or home breaking which also happen in the states.

Don't let people scare you. Stay away from public housing and keep reasonable home hours, you will be fine.

My first son is 100% Puerto Rican and he was born in the island and lives there also. He gave two grandkids that live in the island also. They are all fine, jobs is the issue and taxes are eating a bit into the incomes.

Median household income for a family is around 19.5 K a year, they make it on that so you should do fine if you make 30+. Unless you decide to live like them so you will need less.

My other 2 kids do not speak Spanish either and are not too familiar with the customs either, but they like the food.

My wife is American and she is learning Spanish so we have some similarities you and me. I visit the island several times a year and still have some living family in PR.

What is your profession?

Thank you so much for that! That is pretty much what I was thinking as well. I have cousins that went from NY to Puerto and have been there 20+ years and are happy and might never return to the states. But my family members are from or near Naranjito, and are always telling me its so bad so just stay here. Most of them live in either NY or Florida.
I feel like if I am going to contribute to someones economy it might as well be in PR.
I guess I am more concerned with raising my children fluent in Spanish and aware of the culture. I have friends who never learned spanish and have some resentment towards their parent. Since I have left the east coast, its hard to stay in touch living in Washington. Most of the spanish speakers here are Mexican, and its very hard for me to understand them, unless they speak super proper spanish. No offense to them...
As for taxes, is there anywhere to find out if its similar to Washington? Sometimes I believe they take almost a 3rd of my paycheck. Which is why I have a high 401k contribution, that way I can get some back eventually..

I am currently a Systems Admin. I am in school for Software Development.

For me moving to Puerto Rico is a good idea as it fits my personal requirements without asking  too much from me. I am accepted by my neighbors and community. I live as an artist by my description so I do not fill a traditional role. I am defined as an Americano. From what I have heard from Puerto Ricans who left for the States or grew up in the States and then returned are considered Americanos. There is a difference too. Most of my  "Americano"  friends do not follow the same traditions. They seem more comfortable with English than Spanish. Interests are different too. These comments are from my perspective based on my relationship with "Americanos" living on the South Coast. San Juan could be a whole different experience. Ponce is very Provincial.

Thank you for your response. I have family members that have left and have started their own businesses. I was told that if I wanted to go back, it would be best to have my own business because jobs are hard to come by. Of course I would try to have employment already established before I move there.
I am eager to change my lifestyle to that of an islander. I guess I keep dreaming of the times I spent summers there on vacation and for winter vacations.
I constantly have this guilty feeling of slowly losing everything I know about my culture. I feel like I need to know I am going to PR for the right reasons.

Your salary will be much lower in PR and your taxes will (probably) be higher. That's IF you can get a job, which will be tough unless you've got strong connections to people with hiring authority.

That is exactly what I was afraid of. Of course I would never go unless I had a good job opportunity.

If you need a job, your best bet should be to get a job in the states that let you work remote 100% of the time. Another is to start your own business.

Money you make in the island pays PR taxes, around 60k puts you into 33% tax bracket. U S income pays federal, that includes your 401k distributions.

If you grew up with the culture, you will fall right in just fine. It may take you a year to fully relax, but you will get into it just fine.

Many Puerto Rican's come and go to the states, they have no issues. You may find yourself more at home listening to English news and papers, but you will become more at ease with Spanish the longer you spend in PR.

The main thing is the job that you have to worry about.

By the way, as a sysadmin you should become familiar with either the Azure Cloud Services or the Amazon AWS cloud services. It makes no difference where you live unless your employer mandates you be local. All the systems are in the cloud so there is nothing other than your employer preventing you to be remote.

Gary, one of our members has his own IT company in PR, he lives in Juncos. Maybe you should talk to him about your skills, it could be that he may need someone with your skill set. Check with him, you never know.

Thank you so much Rey! I really appreciate that. I will look into those companies you mentioned. If I could work remotely, it would be perfect!
Its funny because I find myself listening to older spanish music like Eddie Santiago and reruns of El Comay. Because I have no way of getting anything current from the island over here. Its very unfortunate. Plus, the only Puerto Rican restaurant in my town is selling Alacapurrias for $7.00 each! So you can see why I am starting to get desperate.

LOL on the Alcapurrias.
Utube has plenty of Puerto Rican cooking videos, start cooking.
Plenty of semi recent PR music in iTunes, but I like the old stuff anyway. 70's and 80's. To get you started Search iTunes for Ismael Miranda, SieteNueve, Manny Manuel, Mozart La Para, Pedro Capó, Obbie Bermúdez, La Tribu de Abrante, Jeimy Osorio, Kristal Fonrodona, PJ Sin Suela, Jowell y Randy, Tommy Torres, Andy Montañez, Zona de Bomba, Black Guayaba, Manolo Ramos y José Feliciano. or any other music store.

Once you know cloud services you will be in greater demand. Most companies are getting rid of their data centers and moving their applications to the cloud for savings and for scalability.

If you are windows guy I suggest you look into Microsoft Azure.
For Linux and also windows, you should look into Amazon AWS.
A sysadmin is a sysadmin no mater where the systems and apps are located.

I do cook! lol. I cannot find the proper ingredients here like Malanga and stuff like that.
One of my fears is leaving my established position with my benefits. I know here in Washington Amazon is constantly laying people off. I don't know if its related but they do have a bad rep for that.

you misunderstood me, I said train on the service not go work there. The provide the software to create virtual machines at their data centers thruout the world. Great for Disaster Ricovery and for scaling. You can have one instance of a website grow automatically to thousands as the load increases, customers pay by their use. When the load goes down it can go back to a single virtual server to save you money. You can have some instances in the east coast, west coast, UK, etc. The closer to the customer the better but also in case the east or the west coast goes down, UK, Africa and Brazil can continue to operate and take the load.

I would agree with Rey. Get a job that lets you telecommute from PR and you're golden. And if you have to be somewhere in person, it;'s only a plane trip away. Frankly, I envy you. I love PR and will likely spend my last days there. I'm working hard to acquire what you have already in the culture and language.

Thank you Rey, I have started a training course for Microsoft Azure. I really appreciate that tip.
I might have missed it, but why exactly is it better to work remotely?
I slept on it and started thinking that working remotely would prevent me from being able to make friends and meet new people.

Also, would anyone know a pretty nice area to live if you have children?

JCordero83 wrote:

Thank you Rey, I have started a training course for Microsoft Azure. I really appreciate that tip.
I might have missed it, but why exactly is it better to work remotely?
I slept on it and started thinking that working remotely would prevent me from being able to make friends and meet new people.

If you stay home all day and all night you would not make friends, you are right.

The culture in PR is to be friendly, meet the neighbors, go to local bar and have a beer, join a domino game, go to the colmadito and talk with people, sit outside and greed people, ask them questions, go to the gallegueras and bet on the gallos, go to the Ipodromo and bet on the horses, strike a conversation when you are stuck in a line. Talk with the guy that sell the piraguas, y frituras. The more people you meet the more in tune with the culture and the more friends you make. Get out of the house, take a break from work every few hours and meet the people.

JCordero83 wrote:

I might have missed it, but why exactly is it better to work remotely?

If you have a remote job for a mainland based company you are not dependent on the (bad) PR economy.
I try to work as much as possible for non-local companies. They are more reliable and pay better.
F.i. we do service jobs for US store chains. Thinks installing and configuring hardware, troubleshoot & repair equipment like servers, work stations, cash registers etc.
We also do remote system administration, web hosting stuff like that.
About possibly working for me, I'm sorry but (because of the bad economy) at this time I don't have any full time employees. For projects I hire part timers and when the project is done they move on. I'm open about it, I don't promise anybody a chance on a full time job.

My advice for you would be to try to get a remote job, a federal job on the island or start something for yourself that allows you to work from home, wherever that may be, in the US or in PR.

JCordero83 wrote:

Also, would anyone know a pretty nice area to live if you have children?

All of Puerto Rico. Children are everywhere, it depends on the type of life you want to give them. Are you raising them American or Puerto Rican? Sundays there are plenty of activities to take children to. I would recommend living close but not on metro areas. Places like luquillo, Fajardo, Ceiba, Naguabo have plenty of nature, rivers, sea activities, and sports. Or you can send them to private schools or teach them at home. Sports are a big deal in PR.

JCordero83 wrote:

Also, would anyone know a pretty nice area to live if you have children?

There are many nice areas, it depends what you're looking for.
It also highly depends on what you can spend.
If your kids don't (yet) speak Spanish you are going to need a bilingual school close by. Those are the more expensive private schools and they are located in the more expensive areas. Those two factors require a pretty good income.

Hi Gary,
Thank you for your response. Are you able to give me an example of an expensive area where it would have bilingual schools?
Currently I do working remotely, but not entirely. I still need to be able to live close enough that I can go back to the site and reimage computers or phones for users. Since we are a growing company, I am hoping that eventually I can convince them that my position can be done entirely at home.

I guess I mean more of a lower crime neighborhood?
My grandparents are from Naranjito and last time we were there, many homes around us have been aggressively broken into and by people that were known to the neighborhood, and a lot of childhood friends or cousins have turned to drugs. I would have something stolen from me at least once a day. Plus we were almost hit by a car when I realized several stop signs were completely covered by trees and vines and no one was stopping.
Or else I'd just live in one of the empty houses on his land that were abandonded by family members leaving to the states.
I know that all of PR cant be like that. Maybe it was just that small town?

JCordero83 wrote:

Are you able to give me an example of an expensive area where it would have bilingual schools?

Condado  (metro area) (Tasis school).
Guayanabo (metro area) (Baldwin school).
Those two are as far as I know the best (and most expensive) private schools in PR.
Palmas del Mar (south of Humacao)  (Palmas academy)

JCordero83 wrote:

Currently I do working remotely, but not entirely. I still need to be able to live close enough that I can go back to the site and reimage computers or phones for users. Since we are a growing company, I am hoping that eventually I can convince them that my position can be done entirely at home.

It would be nice if you could work work full time from home for your present company. It might be a plan to try to talk to HR and try to set a path in that direction.

JCordero83 wrote:

I guess I mean more of a lower crime neighborhood?

Although I don't have any numbers, from what I hear crime is rising lately.
The areas I mentioned are generally pretty safe, many gated communities, condo's with a security guard. Of course that comes with a price. In the barrio you can rent a place from 300 bucks, in Condado, Guaynabo, Palmas del Mar you should think $800 +

JCordero83 wrote:

I guess I mean more of a lower crime neighborhood?
My grandparents are from Naranjito and last time we were there, many homes around us have been aggressively broken into and by people that were known to the neighborhood, and a lot of childhood friends or cousins have turned to drugs. I would have something stolen from me at least once a day. Plus we were almost hit by a car when I realized several stop signs were completely covered by trees and vines and no one was stopping.
Or else I'd just live in one of the empty houses on his land that were abandonded by family members leaving to the states.
I know that all of PR cant be like that. Maybe it was just that small town?

Desperation causes people to behave in ways that they normally would not. High unemployment and drug addiction are strong motivators. People lose faith but still need to feed their family or addiction.

Gary is right that crime in general is going up but it is not as high as in some of the US cities. Break-in is a matter of that day being your turn, many houses of friends I know have never been touched but one day they will.

Security doors and windows help protect, cameras help document and if the perpetrator is stupid, you just may get their face on film.

Not flashing money or letting people know you have a 90+ inch TV at home helps.

There were a couple of cases where a vehicle and a motorcycle were stolen from a police yard. School breaking are fairly common also, laptops, iPads and items like that are targets in schools, the same with audio visual equipment.

The question to you is in Naranjito, were those places locked, where they protected? were people home at the time of the breaking? Were the owners out for prolonged periods of time (days, weeks) away from the homes?

Abandoned houses or houses left alone for long periods of time are targeted, they steal the appliances, furniture, the windows, the doors, the pipes, the electric cables in the wall, basically they are stripped. This happens often to properties that have been repossessed by the bank. a lot of time banks do nothing with the property for a year or so before they are put for auction. Some also that get stripped like that are homes where the inheritors are not found or are in a court fight, so the property languages and becomes a jungle. Once stripped drug dealers and others use the place, since windows and doors are missing then rain gets in and stuff starts to grow inside or mold takes over all interior walls and floors. This happens not just in PR but also in the states.

Ask your self if the crimes do not happen in the states and in worst numbers

Hello. I too desire to move to Puerto Rico and work as an IT Project Manager. If you interested in relaxed laid back Hawaii style living you may want to consider the Western Coast also. I have been all over th island but this area to me is just unspoiled and amazing.

Anyway check this company out. They are global, 60000 worldwide employees and have a prominent location in Isabela, PR. Fly there once Aguadilla and you will be hooked. Good luck.  Mark

http://www.dxc.technology/

Thank you so much for that website! I will check it out! Do you work from home?

Right now I am still in Atlanta and I work from office and home. I am planning to move to Aguadilla general area late next year or thereafter. I may or may not try to work in IT. If my current company allows me well then of course. If I get a job with the guys I sent you sure.

Otherwise I am ready to do very little.  I want a small house up in the hills and spend my days with the beautiful aBoriquen people learning Spanish, listening to boleros and salsa, playing dominoes, exploring and hitting the beach.

I would rather to grow old and live poor in Puerto Rico (defined by mainlanders. It me) then to continue busting my hump in mainland trying to make money.  My kids are grown. I am free to live my life now.

Keep in touch. Let me know how your doing.  Mark.

I plan to work on average 1 week out of the month, that would be plenty for my needs, but I don't have to, I can always drink beer and play Dominos by the beach.

A man after my own heart!   That sounds like the life I want.

Hey All, it's me again. I haven't posted in a while but I've been reading all the good info. especially from Rey P. My family and I went back to PR this past Spring Break. we looked at another house; a foreclosure that proved to be crappy. We recently found a house on Zillow in Camuy and already contacted the owner for info. Hubby is ready to move whereas I am still very nervous about moving with the economic status of the island and I'm concerned about medical care.

Does anyone know anything about Camuy? Is there mainly retirees or families there? Fun things to do? Good Private schools, stores, near? Can anyone refer us to any financing for PR, many places we've contacted only work within the U.S

I just noticed a new company that moved into a vacant building, in Isabela; they're called, "Synerlutions". As the name implies, they provide Synergistic Solutions to other businesses, including IT. Just for you IT guys & gals.

Hi Renwilson,
Glad to see you back. Also thanks for the compliment, I try.
Unfortunately I know next to nothing about Camuy. It has the famous caves and 40 years ago it was very country, I assume it has changed a lot.
I think Sitka leaves close by and may be able to give you more info.

Thanks Rey. I'll find out who that is and ask. I didn't find much info. But about old caves or so. Just want to know if the area is low key really and I don't have to drive 30 mins. for groceries.

Seems they are building Isabela up to be an IT center for global operations. Awesome news!!!

Sitka is pretty active in the forum and checks at least twice a day. Send him a private message with some questions. Also my friend can probably answer a few also.

mlgreiner13 wrote:

Seems they are building Isabela up to be an IT center for global operations. Awesome news!!!

Several large US companies are there.