Facing a high cost of living, an increasingly divided political climate and yearning for adventure, Americans Joe Reagan and his wife chose to move their family from Maine to Europe in 2016 and never looked back.
Ten years later, Reagan, his wife and four children live a peaceful life in Abruzzo, Italy, surrounded by a close community, unbothered by healthcare expenses or school safety concerns they left behind in the U.S.
The Reagans’ life abroad exemplifies the characteristics that more and more Americans are seeking overseas, Alex Ingrim, a financial advisor from the Pacific Northwest now living in Florence, Italy, told The Independent.
There is no precise number on how many Americans live abroad. However, the Federal Voting Assistance Program, an agency that provides election resources to Americans abroad and military members, estimated 3.3 million U.S. citizens were living abroad in 2024 – a 15 percent increase from 2010. The Association of Americans Overseas estimates 5.5 million Americans lived abroad in 2024, up from 5.4 million in 2023.
Reagan and Ingrim both said they’re seeing this growing trend in real time.
‘Scary expensive with kids’
When Reagan, 44, and his wife decided to move abroad, first to Ireland before settling in Italy, they already had two young children and one on the way.
“I suppose we had the ‘American Dream,’ we had all those things – a car, a house, a nice little neighborhood that we lived in in Southern Maine and good jobs,” Reagan, who works in sales, said.
“It was just like the cost of living was definitely… getting scary expensive with kids,” he added, pointing to the high cost of childcare, formula, diapers and other necessities.
Affordability was top of mind for Reagan at the time, an issue that continues to plague Americans.
While President Donald Trump often touts that the U.S. is living through a “golden era” under his leadership, polling suggests many Americans do not feel that way, especially when it comes to the economy. Approximately 63 percent disapprove of Trump’s handling of the economy, according to a recent Economist/YouGov poll.
Another 70 percent of Americans said they disapprove of how Trump is handling the cost of living, in a new Reuters/Ipsos poll.
Reagan said he and his family were able to afford a home in Abruzzo for €24,000, or around $27,000.
On Reddit threads, Americans rave about living abroad in places like Japan, Thailand, Germany and other countries that provide free healthcare, significantly cheaper higher education and access to more affordable everyday needs such as groceries.
A Wall Street Journal analysis of 15 countries with available data found that at least 180,000 Americans left the U.S. in 2025.
‘Safety, education, university’
Other reasons inspired the Reagan family’s move, including the growing political divide in the country before the 2016 presidential election and safety concerns for his children.
Joe Reagan thinks back to the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting in 2012, when 20 young children and six adults were killed by a gunman.
“That one, to me, was a bridge too far because, to me, we haven’t changed anything,” he said of gun control in the U.S.
Ingrim, the CEO of Liberty Atlantic Advisors, a firm that specializes in providing financial advice to Americans abroad, said his clientele’s demographic has shifted from retirees to Americans in their 30s with families.
“What’s really changed in the last few years is we’re seeing a lot more families move,” Ingrim told The Independent. “We’re getting people that are late 30s, early 40s, that are starting a family… Families concerned about different things like safety, education, university.”
He emphasized the concern for the safety of children in schools.
“The one that you hear about all the time is safety. They want to be able to send their kids to school and know that they’re going to come home at the end of the day,” Ingrim added.
Top countries for those families to relocate to are Spain and Portugal, Ingrim said, citing the low cost of living for both countries. Based on data from Portugal’s Agency for Integration, Migration and Asylum, the Wall Street Journal estimates that roughly 26,000 U.S. citizens were living in Portugal last year.
‘Burned out’
Ingrim credits social media and online resources with inspiring many younger Americans to take the leap of faith and move abroad.
Reagan has used social media to share his story of his move abroad, racking up more than 10,000 followers on Facebook and 48,000 on Instagram. He says he receives “quite a bit” of inquiry from other Americans seeking advice on moving to Europe.
Several companies have emerged, marketing themselves as services to help Americans reallocate, such as Expatsi and GTFO Tours.
In one GTFO Tours success story, a former New Orleans resident who goes by Chef Matt said his new life in the Netherlands has encouraged him to “stop and smell the roses.”
“I was always a little envious of people who could just sit on a bench or at the park and do nothing in the middle of the day until I did it myself and didn’t feel rushed or and didn’t feel an urge to be productive. I rarely, if ever, felt that way back home,” he said.
Ingrim said he’s heard similar from younger Americans, especially those “burned out from working in the tech sector on the West Coast.”
“Change of pace, being burned out by the American lifestyle. They want to slow down, they want to experience something different,” he said.
Reagan notes that major difference when comparing his former life in the U.S. to his life in Italy.
“Those things that you obsess with as a parent in the U.S., you don’t have to obsess about as much here. The endless focus on obtaining more and more capital funds and so on, because you’re at your destination and you can just focus on having a good life,” he said.
For Reagan that includes living in a home with panoramic views of the region, spending time with his family and enjoying a packed social calendar with friends and his local community.
“I’m not sure what would get me to go back,” he said.
