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| Buenos Aires: South American "Paris" with Bikinis! |
It is becoming increasingly popular for New Yorker’s to take their year-end bonuses or real-estate winnings and buy a second home in Buenos Aires. Dominic LoTempio, 31-year-old former vice-president of bond sales with Belgian banking conglomerate KBC, is such a person and has relocated completely to a small town 30 minutes north of Buenos Aires. His new life, including a modern 2-bedroom apartment with garden, infinity pool and a man-made lake for canoeing costs just $1,400 a month. Down the road is a field where he takes off and lands his paraglider from Bliss.“I came to live life as a rich guy,” he says, and whilst he has enough to be a small-time millionaire in New York, LoTempio lives life as if a multi-millionaire in the Argentine paradise he has created for himself. In fact, he has done exactly what many suggested but didn’t have the nerve to do. Working in bond sales, every financial crisis the world over would bring stress and comments like “I could move to Thailand, convert my dollars to baht, live like a millionaire, and never have to work again”. Nobody would ever act on this though, trapped by their work or domestic situations.
As he prepared to quit, Argentina crashed and he could see himself there more than in other economically struggling countries, with Argentina being more cosmopolitan. The 6am wake ups were changed for late nights, and 60+ hour weeks exchanged for no work, spending power and Argentine women.
Since Argentina’s economic collapse in 2001, the city and surrounding countryside has become an expat haven. Argentina’s relaxed immigration laws has allowed many to settle on 90 day visas without issue, meaning the exact number of immigrants of this kind is difficult to establish. However, the number of Americans registered with the embassy between 2004 and 2005 leapt by nearly 13%.
Other popular cities of this kind, that offer relatively inexpensive living are places like Mexico City, Rio de Janeiro and Bangkok. However, generally these countries are ruled out due to rising prices (Mexico and Brazil), the culture difference is too much (Thailand), or the inequality of wealth brings risks to rich Americans (Brazil). With this in mind, Buenos Aires offers a cosmopolitan culture with low prices, great weather, even better food and the chance for a new start.
LoTempio is reminded of New York’s neighbourhoods by Buenos Aires’ barrios, the shops and boutiques of the Recoleta barrio are similar to those of Fifth Avenue, the trendy residential area full of fantastic restaurants is called Palermo Soho, and Barrio Norte reminds him of the Upper West Side.
Another fantastic place to settle is Uruguay’s beautiful Punta del Este. Sun, sea and good surf is on offer here, along with the same benefits mentioned above of life in B.A. Life in B.A for LoTempio is good – he may complain about one-ply toilet paper, slow service in restaurants, an abundance of strikes and the lack of luxury goods on offer in the city, but money will buy you about 10 times the space in a trendy neighbourhood in Buenos Aires. This, plus a fantastic meat meal and bottle of wine for $40 in one of the best restaurants in Buenos Aires; what more do you need?
