In this week’s digest:
- Tips on Finding Your Dream Home Overseas
- Free Report: Overseas Villas for Half the Cost of a Home in the U.S.
- Homes in Europe’s Oldest University Cities from $198,450
- Your Questions Answered on Healthcare in Portugal
As you read this, I’ll have completed my 30-hour ferry trip from southern Ireland to the port of Bilbao in northern Spain.
And I should now be driving the over 400 miles east to the town of Caminha in northern Portugal, which will serve as my base for the next four days.
When my ferry docks in Bilbao on Sunday morning, I’ll be driving straight to the picturesque town of Caminha in northern Portugal.
Regular readers of Your Overseas Dream Home will know how highly I rate Caminha…
Separated from Spain by only a river, this charming town is surrounded by rolling hills, lush forests, bucolic countryside, and soft-sand beaches. Its Old Town is centered on an enchanting cobblestoned plaza where cafés and restaurants circle a 16th-century stone fountain. Narrow alleys and streets lead away from the plaza in all directions, many lined with historic houses with red-tiled roofs.
This is an idyllic vision of small-town Portugal.
Yet real estate prices are a fraction of what you’ll find in comparable coastal towns to the south.
I plan to spend four days in Caminha, using it as a base to scout destinations across northern Portugal.
I count Caminha as one of my best scouting discoveries in recent years. (Indeed, I named it No. 2 on my list of the best places in the world to own real estate in 2024. See the full list here.)
Now I’m hugely excited to return, particularly as I’ll be staying in one of my favorite hotels in the world: Villa Idalina.
The first time I stayed in Villa Idalina, I thought there was a mistake. I paid just over €120 a night, yet the setting was incredible…the service exceptional…the vibe luxurious…and the breakfast sumptuous…
This can’t be right, I thought. I must have missed a zero on the booking. I turned to my wife. “Have I actually booked something that’s €1,200 a night?”
But looking back now, the modest price for that exceptional experience shouldn’t have surprised me…because northern Portugal is still a secret.
Villa Idalina is the perfect base for my scouting trip on this secret coast. Like this region, this hotel flies under the radar and offers exceptional value.
The Algarve is now heaving with summer crowds. Lisbon is well and truly discovered, with eye-watering real estate prices to match. Walk the streets of Porto and it’s like the entire city center is being overhauled and gentrified…
I brought recommendations to my Real Estate Trend Alert group in those places. And I still keep a close eye out for opportunities.
But up around the historic town of Caminha it’s like you’ve stepped back to a time before Portugal’s huge boom in tourism and foreign retirees, investors, and second-home owners.
This region is our chance to replay the Portugal boom…
That’s what I’ll be digging into as I scout destinations in and around Caminha in the coming days.
Stay tuned, I’ll be sharing my insights here in Your Overseas Dream Home.
First, though, here’s a few tips if you’re planning your own scouting trip to Portugal…or indeed any destination overseas…
How to Find Your Dream Home Overseas
I recently got an email from a reader asking for advice on planning his and his wife’s scouting trip to Portugal.
This is a question I regularly get from readers…and there’s definitely a right way and a wrong way to approach a trip like this. So, I’ve written up my best tips on scouting for your dream home overseas.
The first step is crucial: You need to begin by profiling yourself.
Before deciding on destinations to scout, you need to ask yourself important questions like, do you want to live in a city or a more rural location? What type of climate would you like? Are there certain amenities you want to be close to, for example beaches or golf courses or hiking trails?
The answers to these questions will help guide your trip. In fact, this is how I started when I was looking for my home in Portugal. You’ll find the rest of the process I used in my full article here.
Moreover, it’s important to note that while this reader specifically asked about Portugal, a lot of the advice will apply to any country that you’re thinking of scouting for an overseas dream home. Read my tips for finding your dream overseas home here.
Free Report: Villas for Half the Cost of a Home in the U.S.
If you’re thinking of planning a scouting trip to look for your overseas dream home, there’s never been a better time…
The relative value you can get overseas today is massive when you look at current median home sales prices in the U.S.
The National Association of Realtors said that the median sales price of a home in the U.S. (as of June) is over $426,000. That’s the highest it’s ever been. And that’s just the national median. There are many, many places where that number will be even higher. Take California, where it’s over $900,000.
It makes for depressing reading if you’re house hunting or looking for an investment property in the States.
But as a reader of Your Overseas Dream Home, you know that finding exceptional value becomes much easier when you look overseas.
To showcase just how much easier, my team compiled a special report, Overseas Villas for Half the Cost of a Home in the U.S. We looked for villas overseas that were listing for around half that $426,000 median house price in the U.S. And I have to say, even I was surprised by the variety of the homes available at this price point…
- A two-bedroom country villa set on three acres with fruit trees and a small vineyard in Portugal’s Alentejo region for €197,500 ($213,932).
- A restored villa in the awe-inspiring countryside of Tuscany, Italy for €150,000 ($162,480).
- A three-bed villa one block from the beach on the Caribbean coast of English-speaking Belize for $190,000.
And many more…
All the details are in the report here, free to you as an Your Overseas Dream Home reader.
This modern jungle villa is listed at under $200,000…it’s just one of the homes we found overseas for half the median sales price of a home in the U.S. You’ll find more in our special report here.
Homes in Europe’s Oldest University Cities from $198,000
If you’re overseas dream home is in an urban location that offers amazing value, rich history and culture, and excellent quality of living, a very good place to start your search is Europe’s under-the-radar university towns.
Students bring a certain vibe to a destination that you don’t get in other places…a youthful exuberance that infuses itself in the fabric of the city and creates a vibrant and varied atmosphere.
Plus, you have all the culture and facilities that come with having a world-class university nearby…
According to the uniRank database, there are over 2,700 higher-education intuitions in Europe. Of course we’re all familiar with the likes of Oxford, Heidelberg in Germany, Kings College London, and Aarhus in Denmark. And they offer the complete university experience in spades…but if you’re looking to buy a home in these destinations, you may find yourself priced out of the market.
With growing student populations, Europe’s best-known university towns, not unlike many real estate hotspots around the world, are suffering from a scarcity of available properties. And the demand for student accommodation pushes prices up.
But if you look beyond the more famous university cities, you can find good-value options in cities that still offer that historical depth, academic prestige, cultural richness, and innovative spirit that the likes of Cambridge are famous for.
So this week, I asked my team to look into affordable homes for sale in some of Europe’s smaller university cities. And we focused this search on cities that had some of the oldest universities on the continent (all the cities featured have universities that are at least 600 years old).
Check out what we uncovered in the full article here…
One of the homes we uncovered is in a university city in the South of France that boasts incredible architecture, art galleries, museums, nightlife and dining, and even its own arc de triomphe. Learn more in the full article here.
Your Questions Answered
Have a question or comment for me or my team? A recommendation for me while I’m on the ground in northern Portugal? Share it here. Here’s a question I got from an Overseas Dream Home reader…
Steve R. asks: I was following your team’s coverage of northern Portugal recently, and was wondering what the medical care in the small towns you mention is like? I am older and it would be smart to be near a hospital. Any advice from you would be deeply appreciated.
Ronan says: Hi Steve, that’s a good question. If you’re going to spend time living overseas, it’s a good idea to check whether the area has everything you think you’ll need, either now or in the future.
Portugal has an excellent healthcare system. It consistently ranks highly in the World Health Organization’s rankings.
Residents of Portugal, including expats, have access to both the public and the private healthcare systems. The public system is free to join and covers all ages. Small copays do apply when seeing a doctor or being hospitalized up to a certain age, and then it’s free.
Most expats also carry private health insurance since it’s a requirement of the resident visa, and they prefer to use the private healthcare system since it’s more like what they are accustomed to in the U.S. This private system, though, is far more affordable than healthcare in the U.S.
To give you an example of costs, International Living reports that an expat spent six days a private hospital, in a private room, with daily medication and testing, for a total cost of €1,400 (around $1,550). And that was before she submitted the bill to her insurance company to reclaim expenses.
In terms of medical care in the small towns in northern Portugal, you may have to travel to larger cities for certain treatments or procedures. Though the distances here are short. For instance, Caminha, which is in the far north of Portugal, is only about an hour’s drive from Porto, Portugal’s second largest city.
I’ll also add that when you look overseas in general, most of the countries on my beat offer exceptional healthcare for both residents and visitors. Take Mexico, for example. The cost of care is low, the quality of care is excellent, and many healthcare professionals speak English.
Costa Rica has one of the best healthcare systems in the world…the capital of San Jose has three JCI-accredited private hospitals—the highest international accreditation for medical centers. And there are numerous private clinics throughout the country. In addition, the public system has over 29 hospitals and nearly 250 regional clinics, making it easy to find healthcare throughout the country.
Panama too has top-quality clinics and hospitals located across the country. And since the country is so small, you’re unlikely to be more than an hour from a modern facility. It’s also not unusual to find English-speaking doctors there, as many study abroad after finishing the required training in Panama.
For more information on healthcare in countries around the world, International Living has a wealth of information on its website. Check it out here.
Ronan McMahon, Founder, Overseas Dream Home & Real Estate Trend Alert
