Ask Us Anything: Will We Ever Stop and Settle Down? What Do We Do for a Mailing Address?

How much do we work a week? Is it *really* that easy to leave America for another country? Plus, why Starbucks?

This is a regular column where we answer your travel-related questions. If you ask nicely, we might even answer your non-travel-related ones too!

Have a question for a future column? Ask it here.

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Have you given any thought to where you might eventually settle down? Are you going to keep traveling indefinitely? - Alec

This is the question we get more than any other. We’re a bit worried you guys want us to stop traveling!

When we left Seattle at the end of 2017, we planned to give this “nomad” experiment at least a year. We figured it would take at least that long to decide whether it was right for us.

About three weeks in, we looked at each other and said, “This is awesome! We’re never going back.”

But over the past seven years, many of our new nomad friends have given up “the lifestyle” — some due to age, some due to health issues, and some just wanting something different.

And we know that one day we’ll probably also say, “Whoa, doggy! Time to hang up our backpacks.”

When that happens, we could go back to America. But, well, that option really does depend on the results of this fall’s election. And even apart from Trump, Brent is a lot more open to returning to the U.S. than I am.

So as we’ve traveled the world, we’ve kept our eyes open for a place that we like enough to make it our “forever home.”

We’ve considered some of the places we’ve visited: Mexico City; Chiang Mai, Thailand; Sydney, Australia; Wellington, New Zealand; and a couple of places in Central Europe. And we plan to keep exploring potential places off the beaten path in Italy, Greece, and Spain.

So far, we have yet to find “the one” — a place where we both feel we could live the rest of our lives. But we have found places where one of us thinks he could live forever.

Last month, we spent four weeks in Oslo, Norway, and Brent says he could absolutely settle down there. And Norway is a fantastic country.

In Oslo with our friend Marrianne.

But Norway also has long, dark, cold winters that I don’t think I could handle — especially as I get older.

So the search continues.

-Michael

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Do you still keep a U.S. address? For what exactly? How does that work? And does that mean you have to pay state and local taxes? — Meghan

Yes, we keep a U.S. address, and all American nomads I know do too. On one hand, it’s been surprisingly easy to move most of our affairs into the cloud.

But the “most” in that sentence is doing a lot of work. There are still reasons why you need some kind of physical address.

For example, we need an address to:

• File an income tax return (which is, of course, required for all U.S. citizens, even if you don’t owe any taxes). Local taxes depend on the state where your address is located, but we used to live in Washington State, which has no state income tax.

• Register to vote, which we think is essential (but also makes us susceptible to jury duty, which can be a pain to deal with when we’re out of the country).