How Buying Real Estate Can Get You Residency or a Second Passport

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In this episode of the Real Estate Pros Podcast, host Micah Johnson interviews Ladislas, an expert in international real estate investment and citizenship by investment. Ladi shares his journey from working in corporate to exploring real estate opportunities around the world, particularly in emerging markets. He discusses the benefits of investing overseas, including diversification, potential residency, and citizenship options. The conversation also covers the importance of having a solid team, including lawyers and realtors, to navigate the complexities of international investments. Listeners gain insights into the mindset needed for overseas investments and practical steps to take when considering such opportunities.

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The Wandering Investor (00:00)
Four hundred thousand dollars in any real estate in the country. Right. We’re talking of Turkey, a country of

over 80 million people at the crossroads between Europe and Asia, Istanbul, a commercial capital of over 15 million people that has been at the century, that has been at the heart of history for millennia, really. ⁓ Everyone does business in Istanbul and you just need to buy real estate there. Any real estate on the open market, you’re not restricted to some overpriced projects.

Micah Johnson (00:27)
Yeah.

The Wandering Investor (00:36)
400,000 and within one year, they will grant you, you, your spouse and all your underage children citizenship, like an actual passport.

Micah Johnson (02:19)
Hey everyone, welcome to the Real Estate Pros Podcast. I’m your host, Micah Johnson. And today I am joined by someone who is making moves in the international emerging market space. Ladislas Maurice Welcome in, man. Glad to have you.

The Wandering Investor (02:34)
Thank you Micah, how are you?

Micah Johnson (02:37)
I’m doing well, doing well. I think our listeners are really going to take some valuable information away and some interesting things that honestly I haven’t thought about before that we were discussing in our pre-talk there, but we’re coming on live. So let’s dive in. So first off for people who may not be familiar with your world, give us the short version and what’s your main focus these days?

The Wandering Investor (02:59)
Sure, so essentially I travel around the world full time looking at real estate and investment migration opportunities. So what we do is we help people not just invest in real estate in mostly emerging markets, but we also help people acquire second residences like a Plan B residency and also second passports because it is possible to just buy a citizenship.

Micah Johnson (03:23)
Interesting. Okay, we’re going to unpack that for sure. So let’s rewind for just a second and tell us how you got here. How did you end up in the current space that you’re in?

The Wandering Investor (03:34)
Yeah. So initially I just studied, I just did a BBA in international business in Canada. Then I went to grad school in Australia and business in law. Then I ended up working for Nestle, the big food company. Some say the big evil food company in Nestle at their headquarters. And then they sent me to Africa for seven years. So actually I spent most of my twenties in Africa. So in South Africa for a bit and then three years in Ghana.

Micah Johnson (03:51)
Yes.

The Wandering Investor (04:02)
And in Ghana, I was in charge of the milk business for Nestle, for Ghana, Ivory Coast, Sierra Leone, and Liberia. And then at the age of 30, I left, I wanted to try something new. And my objective initially was to look for a job in Dubai before it was cool. and uh but before doing this, because my parents were retiring at the same time as I was you know in between,

Micah Johnson (04:13)
Whoa.

The Wandering Investor (04:32)
we went on a road trip together. So we took the car from Oman in the Middle East, um drove into Dubai, put the boat on a ferry to Iran. We drove all across Iran, went into Armenia, went into Georgia, crossed all of Turkey, drove into Greece, up to Ukraine, and then we drove to Paris. And it was the first time that I had two things going on. I had time, I had a lot of time. ⁓

really no time pressure and money, money from having, you know, saved, saved over the years as an expat in Africa. So, and when we’re going around all these random places, I’d go, you know, into real estate agencies. I’d meet expats. I’d meet local business people. You know, I’d go talk to lawyers. And then I saw some of these markets were really interesting. So what I started doing was buying units, renovating and flipping.

And I never really got to looking for a job in Dubai. Now it’s been a decade and I travel around the world. I do real estate deals mostly in emerging markets. And then gradually I got into that residency and passport space because in some cases when you buy real estate, some governments will grant you a residency permit for you and your family that you can keep in your back pocket. And in other cases, they’ll even give you a citizenship, like an actual passport that goes down the generations.

Micah Johnson (06:23)
Thank

The Wandering Investor (06:46)
So that’s how I got into this really interesting space.

Micah Johnson (06:49)
Now, what was the first country that you bought property in that did those flips?

The Wandering Investor (06:54)
So the first property I ever bought, that’s when I was still working, was actually in the US. ⁓ But the first time I ventured outside of the US was going into Austria, going into Hungary, Montenegro, and Ivory Coast in West Africa.

Micah Johnson (07:14)
Now what drew you to those locations?

The Wandering Investor (07:16)
Hungary because deeply undervalued uh at the time in 2016 prices were dirt cheap for a beautiful capital city like Budapest and made absolute sense to be buying real estate there and the yields were quite high at the time. um Net rental yields after all expenses of about 6-7 % for a capital city, which is very, very attractive. Austria because they just kept lowering the interest rates.

and you could just tell the prices were going to go up massively. And they did exit at that market at the peak. And then Ivory Coast, because the country had emerged out of civil war and the fundamentals were quite good and real estate was quite affordable.

Micah Johnson (07:58)
So for someone that’s listening to this and might be interested and has maybe never thought about investing outside of America before and is really interested in this idea, what would they want to think about first? What’s is what’s kind of that mindset that makes doing this attractive to an investor?

The Wandering Investor (08:17)
So I’ll preface this by saying that when you go online, listen to some podcasts or see ads or whatever, you’ll see people telling you how you can make a lot of money with real estate in Panama or real estate in Dubai and you can make extremely high, net rental yields, et cetera. It’s mostly lies. Objectively in most cases, you can find better deals in the U S than overseas. Why one.

because the US market is so dynamic. Even when there’s a crisis in the US, there’s always some random city in some state that’s booming. You literally just need to look at a map of the US and be wondering, okay, where are the catalysts? Where are the micro markets that are doing well? There’s always some place that’s doing well. Two, you have access to really cheap bank credit. Very easy, you have access to mortgages for days. I mean, endless.

As soon as you venture overseas, it becomes mostly a cash market as a foreigner, especially as a U.S. person because banks don’t like dealing with U.S. people overseas. So you move from a market that you know that you can you know how to operate in. You understand the risks. You probably have a legal team. You understand culturally how deals operate. You can get pretty competent property management and you have access to credit to markets where

You don’t really have access to any of this or a lot less. So the risk goes up. And when the risk goes up, it also means that potentially the returns go down as well for you. So I’m not saying you shouldn’t do it. I’m saying when you venture into real estate overseas, understand that you’re doing it. You should be doing it for three primary reasons. And that’s not to say that there aren’t markets with high rental yields. I’m investing in Columbia.

I’m making nine to 10 % net. I’m investing in Kenya. I’m going to be making eight to 10 % net after all you know deductions and expenses and occupancy, blah, But they’re higher up the risk curve. But you should be doing it for three main reasons. One is diversification. Once you start reaching a certain level of net wealth,

it becomes objectively unreasonable to be all in a single jurisdiction.

You’re always one law way from being in a very bad tax situation. You’re always one crazy government decision away from being all in in the wrong basket. Right? So I’m not trying to, I’m not saying the dollar is going to crash. It’s the end of the world, you know, sell your dollars by Chinese Yuan. This is not the message. The message is as you become richer, you should diversify a little bit more.

Micah Johnson (11:18)
Hmm.

The Wandering Investor (11:46)
And when you think of diversification, it shouldn’t just be, I’m invested in Texas and Colorado. I’m diversified between two states. You should be looking at completely different jurisdictions and currencies internationally. So it’s often politically driven, what I’ve noticed with Americans, Canadians too, to be fair, especially in today’s climate. you know, when Biden was in power, Republicans, they were venturing overseas and now that it’s

Trump and power, it’s Democrats, they’re venturing overseas. I’ll put it this way, there are just rational people on both sides of the aisle that are just venturing overseas because they see that whatever side it is, the reality is the tension keeps growing and that’s a little unhealthy fundamentally for the country, for the economy, for everything going forward socially. So they’re just happy to have a little bit of money overseas.

Micah Johnson (12:22)
Mm.

Mm.

The Wandering Investor (12:35)
When you have real estate overseas, guess what? You also have a local bank account so you can stash some money overseas. As long as you declare it to the IRS, there’s a form you have to fill out every year. It’s fine, it’s completely legal. You can have access to different currencies this way. And then also for some people, there’s the lifestyle aspect. They want a property that they can go to, spend some time. When they’re not there, they can put it on Airbnb. And then lastly, and this is where things become really interesting. Some countries,

will grant your residency permit for buying real estate to you and your whole family that you don’t necessarily need to spend much time on the ground to keep active. So means that if you ever felt you needed to leave for whatever reason, there’s a country that accepts you with open arms and that has already recognized you as a resident. So you can move there anytime, work, you know, bank, do business, et cetera. You know, your kids can go to school.

Micah Johnson (13:17)
.

The Wandering Investor (13:32)
access to you know healthcare, everything, you’re a resident. And then some countries will, I’ll give you an example, Panama, Panama is a good one. You just need to put $200,000 in real estate and they’ll give you residency to you and your whole family, temporary residency that you renew. Or if you put 300,000, they’ll give you permanent residency for life. And then you just need to go back to the country. You just need to fly to Panama once every two years to keep it active.

Micah Johnson (13:56)
Wow.

The Wandering Investor (14:02)
And in Panama, what you have access to? You have access to banking, really affordable healthcare, all of that, you know, and you can just keep this in your back pocket for you and your family. And all you need to do is to keep the investment depending on the program you choose there for between three and five years. Then you sell, you can bring the money back to the U.S. but you still keep that residency permit.

Micah Johnson (15:07)
So even once you don’t have the property, you have residency still. Wow. Same kind of criteria applied back once every two years.

The Wandering Investor (15:07)
You can also just, yeah. Yeah, you can even have a program 200.

Yeah, it’s amazing. There’s even a program where you can put $200,000 in a term deposit. you like there’s so many people like a in your audience. They’re sitting on a bunch of money in term deposits in the US. You take this. You take $200,000 shift it to a bank in Panama. You’ll you’ll get about 4 % net a year. That’s it. You get residency for you and your family. You’ll need three trips in two and a half years.

of about a week each, which is fine, vacation in Panama. After which you’ll get permanent residency and then it’s just one trip every two years. And then after three years, you take your money back to the US, you’re good.

Micah Johnson (15:48)
It’s.

The Wandering Investor (15:58)
and you get,

Micah Johnson (15:58)
you keep that

citizenship. That’s awful.

The Wandering Investor (16:01)
a residency permit. So you’re not a citizen, but you have a card. It’s like a green card. You can live there, you can work there, you can do business there, you can open bank accounts there, you have access to healthcare there. It’s almost like, why would you not do this? And it’s right around the corner. It’s not like Panama’s far. You’re not flying all the way to Asia or to Europe or same time zone, just a few hours, make a beach vacation out of it.

Micah Johnson (16:07)
Residential Department, excuse me, okay.

Yeah.

The Wandering Investor (16:27)
Things like, it’s such a no brainer. ⁓ Once you reach a certain net worth, and if you’re sitting on cash anyways as diversification, as part of your overall portfolio strategy, you have X amount in term deposits, guess what? Just do the Panama thing. And if you really need the money, just take it before three years, you just lose the permit. The only downside is you’ll have paid like whatever $10,000 in legal fees for the whole thing, which is fine.

So, you know, that’s one. And then another one is, you know, going a little bit crazier down the down the curve here is Turkey. And Turkey is amazing. It’s an it’s an amazing opportunity. And I know a lot of people, they hear Turkey, they hear Muslim, they’re like, blah, blah. Just like just listen to me. ⁓

Four hundred thousand dollars in any real estate in the country. Right. We’re talking of Turkey, a country of

over 80 million people at the crossroads between Europe and Asia, Istanbul, a commercial capital of over 15 million people that has been at the century, that has been at the heart of history for millennia, really. ⁓ Everyone does business in Istanbul and you just need to buy real estate there. Any real estate on the open market, you’re not restricted to some overpriced projects.

Micah Johnson (17:39)
Yeah.

The Wandering Investor (17:49)
400,000 and within one year, they will grant you, you, your spouse and all your underage children citizenship, like an actual passport.

After three years, you can sell or after five years, you can sell without local capital gains taxes, which doesn’t mean you wouldn’t have your U.S. capital gains taxes to pay that something else. And you keep it. And then whenever you have other children,

Micah Johnson (18:03)
Holy cow.

The Wandering Investor (18:15)
They become Turkish whenever your children have children. As long as they register the birth at a Turkish embassy or in Turkey, they’ll be Turkish too. So just by shifting $400,000 to real estate in Turkey, in one of the world’s biggest and most historical cities, Turkey is not a backwater. Turkey is a developed country ultimately, especially Istanbul.

You just shift some assets you have back in the US to Turkey for three to five years. And then you’re giving your whole family and your whole descendants. That’s a generational move. A Turkish passport, which gives them access to healthcare, to a different part of the world. You know, you can, some people are, can then do business in other countries that, you know, as a US person, you can’t really do business in.

Micah Johnson (18:55)
Yeah.

The Wandering Investor (19:07)
⁓ There’s a whole bunch of reasons why you’d want another passport. So and the yields, you’ll be making net yields of about, after all expenses, everything about four to 5%, which is fine. And the economy when it comes to real estate is pretty dollarized because there has been a lot of inflation in Turkey, et cetera. But there are ways around that. I I own a bunch of real estate in Turkey and it’s fine. like

Micah Johnson (19:14)
gives you more access.

The Wandering Investor (19:36)
Even though the inflation is like 40 % a year, it’s totally manageable. You just need to build it into the contracts, into the lease agreements.

Micah Johnson (19:41)
Interesting.

So let’s dig into someone that would be thinking for the first time. Okay. I’m interested in buying something overseas or in a different country. One, how do I pick? What am I thinking about? And then what kind of team am I going to need? How do you go from, I want to, to I have this thing.

The Wandering Investor (20:02)
Cool. So the first thing is being clear with your objective. Different countries, different markets serve different purposes, just like in the U.S., right? Investing in multi-housing in Detroit is not the same as buying a beach condo in Florida, right? It’s different purposes, different markets, different world. So it’s the same thing overseas, just even more. Because some countries will give you passports, other this, that higher yields.

Micah Johnson (20:18)
Mm-hmm.

The Wandering Investor (20:28)
you know, where you want to spend time doesn’t matter. So really, what are your objectives? Then we look, then we drill down, we look at the different jurisdictions that would be a good fit for you. And then it’s about having the good team on the ground, good realtors. And then also a good lawyer. That’s important. So what is a good lawyer? And this is really important, right? Cause sometimes you’ll watch Fox news and you’ll hear of, ⁓ Kevin went to Mexico and he bought land and then

After having built a house on it, then he found out it wasn’t his land. Then he lost everything. Look, Kevin just bought land in Mexico through his girlfriend’s uncle, right? And just signed some random paperwork at a notary public, not knowing what he was signing. Stories like this very rarely happen. If you have a good lawyer, you’ll be fine. That’s all you really need. Just always remember if you venture overseas, get a good lawyer. Lesson number one. Two, what is a good lawyer?

A good lawyer is never cheap. Okay will always shame you for overpaying for your locals, for overpaying for your lawyer as a foreigner. Why do you want to overpay? Because you want lawyers that understand the problems or the challenges that foreigners may face in their country.

It’s the same thing if you as if I as a foreigner were to invest in the US just on my own without really understanding things. I wouldn’t make big mistakes from a structural point of view. And I’ve seen it so many times. People invest in the US. They don’t get a they don’t get the right type of account and CPA. And then they just buy terribles. They buy using a terrible structure and then they get hammered from a tax point of view. The.

When you invest as a foreigner, your issues will be a little different than the issues that locals face. So I’ll give you an example. Columbia. Columbia is great. Like Medellin, booming city, booming tourism, a lot of fun. A lot of Americans are investing down there and you can get net rental yields these days in the market of between seven and 8%, which is quite good, especially taking into account that from a lifestyle point of view, it’s really good. So you could get like good lifestyle out of it.

Micah Johnson (22:17)
Yeah, please.

The Wandering Investor (22:37)
You can also get a residency permit out of it if you want. But when you invest in Columbia, you need to register your money with the central bank because there are limited capital controls in Columbia. So you can just like right now, if I just use a local lawyer who doesn’t know, he’ll tell me, you can buy, the money to the seller’s account. Sure, send the money to the seller’s account.

But then in five years time or 10 years time, when I’d look to sell and bring the money back to the U S the bank will ask me, where’s your central bank declaration? I’ll be like, what? I’ll be like, sorry. ⁓ you didn’t declare the money coming into Columbia. So you can’t take it out of Columbia. So you can just, you know, reinvest it in Columbia. And that happens to a lot of people, because they don’t use a lawyer or they’ll use a, just a generic Colombian lawyer that is the friend of their

Micah Johnson (23:12)
you

The Wandering Investor (23:30)
girlfriend or wife or friend. But you need a lawyer that understands what foreigners go through. And he would tell you, first things first, we send the money to the bank and then we make this declaration. It’s just one piece of paperwork. We charge you $80. And then you’ll be fine. Just keep a copy. We’ll also keep a copy for you so that if you lose your copy in 10 years time, you can reach out. We’ll still have it.

And then you’re fine. So it’s, you know, the problem is often people don’t use lawyers or cheap out on lawyers. If you just use a good competent lawyer, you won’t have any problems. Sometimes people ask me, how do you find good competent lawyers on our website? We have a list of good competent lawyers, but also you can just go to the U S embassy website or the French embassy website or the UK high commission or the Canadian embassy. And many of these big embassies will have lists of recommended law firms.

And those are usually the bigger law firms, a bit more expensive, but you know at least they’ll be generally honest and competent.

Micah Johnson (24:33)
And yeah, I mean, if you’re going to take this on, this sounds like the kind of project where you want to make sure you’re crossing all your T’s and dotting your I’s the correct way. if you don’t want it to go south, do it the right way out of the gate, right?

The Wandering Investor (24:47)
Exactly.

And it’s not, you know, it’s not that complicated. It’s again, if you have a lawyer that, you know, walks through, walks you through the process and a realtor that also deals with foreigners, it’ll be fine. It’ll be perfectly fine.

Micah Johnson (24:59)
Interesting. Okay, so someone is first off, what we want to they want to do is really understand why they’re going to invest abroad. Knowing that mission first that directs market. So not the other way around. You’re not thinking market first, you’re thinking personal goals first. This a lifestyle change I want? Is this a second residency that I’m looking for?

Those kinds of things are much bigger factors than just what kind of cap rate I can get.

The Wandering Investor (25:30)
I mean, some people say I want the best cap rate, but I want it to be outside of the US. Then it’s like, fine, we’ll find you the best cap rate outside of the US. Doesn’t care about passports, residencies, doesn’t care about lifestyle, pure investment. I don’t want to be all in the US. Perfectly fine, we can find that. Just make sure you have cash. Because there’s no line of credit where we’re going.

Micah Johnson (25:56)
Now, dig into that a little bit. What’s it like to buy another property in a different country? What is that process? I’m guessing it’s not the same everywhere, obviously, but what is that? What are the differences you deal with?

The Wandering Investor (26:10)
slower, definitely slower than the US. ⁓ I mean, some countries will be fast like Hungary, it’ll, you know, we will get your title deed in two to three weeks. Other countries, especially in Latin America, getting your title deed, like the whole thing will be like a six month process. ⁓ So often, it’s just slower. That’s it. You know, those steps will be a little bit different and all that. But like the lawyer helps you with that. You no need to worry about any of that. Some countries don’t have escrow.

Sometimes that’s a little disturbing for Americans, but you know, it just gets managed differently. You’re at the node Republic, you make the transfer in front of them and you know, and everyone will sign the documents and the lawyer will, will keep the documents until the money is received and things like that. Like, so I wouldn’t worry too much about the lack of escrow because the market understands how to operate around that. but yeah, that’s it. It’s,

Micah Johnson (26:52)
Okay.

The Wandering Investor (27:07)
It’s not that complicated. It’s fine.

Micah Johnson (27:09)
So really don’t let it be bigger than you think it is. Just because you haven’t done it doesn’t make it completely undoable. Now, who have you found and who you’ve worked with? We talked a little bit about that you have a newsletter that we’ll mention here in a little bit. Make sure people can get connected with you.

The Wandering Investor (27:16)
Absolutely.

Micah Johnson (27:26)
It was around that education piece around someone that’s how fellow how fast from someone’s listen to this and says, okay, I want to do this from that moment until they’re ready to buy something. What do you recommend that they’re thinking about? not be beyond just the giving them a time frame, right? A of people want to make a decision and go fast, but being realistic to themselves and to make a good choice.

What do you think that lag way is?

The Wandering Investor (27:54)
people should spend time on the ground. It is possible to buy remote in most countries entirely remotely. But just go spend time on the ground. Go to the country, go spend a vacation, go spend a week, two weeks, get a feel for it. And then you’ll be in a much better position to make a decision. Like At the end of the day, there’s no need to rush into anything. You know the house is not on fire. Just make sure you’re comfortable. Go spend some time on the ground.

That’d be my biggest piece of advice. Just be careful with people that are trying to sell you things like remote and say, ⁓ this pre-construction deal is going to be available for another 10 days. You know. Send $5,000 to to book your unit. just you know It’s fine. There’ll be another deal. Yeah, I mean, they’re not necessarily scams. Yeah, they’re not necessarily scams. They’re just hard selling. You don’t have to go through this.

Micah Johnson (28:38)
Watch out for the scam. No princes need your money in real estate either.

The Wandering Investor (28:50)
Like just take your time.

Micah Johnson (28:50)
Now for your company, so you own a company called The Wandering Investor. How do you service or how do you work with other people besides doing this for yourself? Is there something that you do there?

The Wandering Investor (29:01)
Sure, we offer consulting calls, helping people work on their strategies. And then we have a whole list of preferred suppliers, preferred partners all over the world and in different countries. And then we’re also a citizenship by investment company. So we help people directly acquire citizenships. So people who want to pay, just pay and get a passport, we help with that. we’re licensed agents, for example, for two African countries.

for South Tomei and for Sierra Leone. And we work directly with the government appointed people and we help process people’s applications to obtain a second citizenship. So you could be sitting in Iowa right now thinking, hey, you know I think that maybe it would be an interesting, maybe I should get a second passport for whatever reason. For me, for my descendants, you know we can do that all remote in three to four months. You’ll have your.

your citizenship and your passport coming by the mail, coming by DHL.

Micah Johnson (30:03)
Due to the unique niche this is, think it’s awesome you’ve built something that if you desire to do this, someone can kind of come plug in and capitalize on your expertise already.

The Wandering Investor (30:13)
It’s, yeah, I mean, it’s fun. It’s a lot of fun.

Micah Johnson (30:19)
Well, that’s what I love about real estate in general is it’s such a big term and even get to talk with you today. It’s a worldwide term and there’s niches all in it where if you just keep participating, you will find that part that you enjoy that lines up with you as a person. It fills your cup to do, right? I love making money, but getting my emotional paycheck filled also is great and being able to do both at the same time.

That’s what makes life kind of fulfilling, right?

The Wandering Investor (30:49)
Absolutely. I mean, there’s a world of opportunity out there

Micah Johnson (30:56)
Pun intended, I love it. A lot of sloths, man, I’ve really enjoyed our conversation. I appreciate your time, your story, your perspective. We need more people in this space, in my opinion, doing it like you’re doing it. If someone wanted to be able to touch base with you and reach out and learn more, what is the best way to find you?

The Wandering Investor (31:13)
So I have a YouTube channel the wandering investor I document things as I travel around the world but the most important one would be the newsletter and notes from the road newsletter I write on a very regular basis and share my insights on all these topics as I travel around the world right now I’m in Cambodia for a few weeks and looking at the real estate market for example

Micah Johnson (31:33)
I’m it out, I love it, I love it. So we’ll make sure that those links are in the description and that you’re able to connect with Lotoslaus if you wanna find out more. And for those of you tuning in who got value from this, please subscribe, thank you for watching. We’ve got more conversations coming up with operators just like Ladislas who are making waves and building real businesses all around the world. Thank you so much for watching and we’ll see you in the next episode.

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How Buying Real Estate Can Get You Residency or a Second Passport

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