OceanBeach92107 wrote:THIGV wrote:gobot wrote:I have never heard of any country expelling all residents who are not working, "cleaning house" of foreigners. And there is no retirement visa.
Not having a retirement visa seems to be a conscious decision of the Vietnamese government, and one that has been pointed out innumerable times on this forum. Given that other ASEAN countries have such visas means that they are fully aware of the possibility and yet chose to ignore it. Perhaps they have examined the impact of such visas in the Philippines and Thailand and decided they don't like what they see. Even spouses of citizens are subject to either 3 or 5 year renewals. Perhaps they simply feel that the gain from non-working foreigners is not worth the trouble. We can argue day and night but it is their decision.
Actually, there IS a "retirement" visa here, and in some ways it's better than one of Thailand's options; in other ways, not.
In Thailand, if you deposit 800,000 Thai Baht (todày about $25,550 USD) in a Thai bank, you can get a retirement visa (other options based on income of at least 70,000 THB a month).
But you have to be at least 50 years old.
In Vietnam, you can get an investor TRC for a 3 billion VND (about $130,253.00 USD) in an authorized company's bank.
But there is no low age limit (maybe 18 years old?).
Not an option for someone without assets and on a pension or two, but people such as my upwardly mobile, upper middle-class 40 year old nephew could probably do that easily.
Also, as surprising as it seems to be, some retirees over 65 years old have saved a half million dollars or more for retirement, and they have significant equity in homes on which they have been making mortgage payments for 20 or 30 years.
I'm definitely not saying whether it's a good or bad idea to make that kind of investment.
I think a lot of people here would say it would be crazy to take good money and make a significant investment like that in Vietnam.
But for some people, it's a good option.
Vietnam also has a 1 year investor visa for a smaller amount invested (I forget if it's in the hundreds of millions or billions; Ciambella posted the new amounts a while back)
So certainly not as easy as retiring in Thailand.
Maybe comparable to the Golden Passport in Portugal?
The Thai option seems more feasible, the VN one sounds like a lot of risk. I doubt too many people would want to risk 130k just to get a DT visa. As you said, it is an option.