The Limited Times

Now you can see non-English news...

Retirement in the South: What retirees need to know

2022-05-11T07:01:08.163Z


Retirement in the South: What retirees need to know Created: 05/11/2022Updated: 05/11/2022 08:44 By: Wolfgang DePonte Sea view on Mallorca: many retirees dream of retiring under palm trees. © Imago Around 1.75 million pensioners receive their pension abroad. An overview shows what retirees should consider when moving to another country. Munich – Better weather isn't the only reason why more a


Retirement in the South: What retirees need to know

Created: 05/11/2022Updated: 05/11/2022 08:44

By: Wolfgang DePonte

Sea view on Mallorca: many retirees dream of retiring under palm trees.

© Imago

Around 1.75 million pensioners receive their pension abroad.

An overview shows what retirees should consider when moving to another country.

Munich – Better weather isn't the only reason why more and more pensioners are spending their old age in the south.

Such a move can also have simple economic reasons.

With an average pension of 1000 euros, many pensioners in Germany can only live to a limited extent.

The situation of pensioners is likely to deteriorate in the future, in particular due to the ever-increasing cost of living and the taxation of pensions.

That's why quite a few think about emigrating, because the cost of living is significantly lower in many sunny countries - and that means: Purchasing power increases and with it the quality of life.

Retirement: These are the favorite destinations for retirees abroad

Popular destinations for emigration are primarily non-European destinations due to the significantly lower cost of living.

Southeast Asian countries like Bali (Indonesia), Thailand, Cambodia or the Philippines are the favourites.

Retirees who don't want to go that far end up in Turkey, Bulgaria or Portugal.

Do you also get your pension transferred abroad?

If you only travel more often or longer, maybe want to spend the entire winter on the Canary Islands, nothing will change for you.

In the case of a temporary stay abroad, the pension insurance transfers the full pension.

Also for retirees who want to move permanently to an EU country, for example to the previous holiday home in Spain, nothing changes as a rule.

This also applies to Iceland, Liechtenstein, Norway and Switzerland.

Those who are permanently “away from home” in retirement (e.g. in Canada) will in most cases also receive their full pension there as usual.

There is a social security agreement with Canada.

This also applies to 20 other countries, including Australia, Brazil, Israel, the Philippines, the USA and Tunisia.

Destination: Where a pension cut is imminent

If the "long-term trip" is to a country that does not belong to the EU and with which there is no social security agreement, there may be deductions from the pension.

How high they are in individual cases is determined individually.

Pension abroad: where is the money transferred to?

The pensioner decides which account the pension should go to. To do this, the bank details must be given and a payment declaration must be submitted on which the bank confirms the account details.

The cost of the transfer is covered by the pension insurance.

However, the pension insurance does not compensate for any bank charges or exchange rate losses.

1.75 million pensions go abroad

The German pension insurance transfers around 1.75 million pensions (about seven percent of all pensions) abroad, the majority to former guest workers who have their old-age pensions transferred home.

Around 240,000 pensions go to German “emigrants”.

According to the German pension insurance, most of them live in Switzerland (26,000), Austria (25,000), USA (24,000), France (17,700), the Netherlands (10,500) and Italy (7268).

In Greece, around 100,000 people receive a pension from Germany, of which 3,000 are German “emigrants”, in Turkey there are around 75,000, of which 3,190 are pensioners from Germany.

Important document: the certificate of life

After moving abroad, Deutsche Post's pension service checks annually whether the pension recipient is still alive.

For this purpose, a “certificate of life” must be completed once a year.

This does not apply to countries that reliably report deaths.

These include, for example, Spain and Switzerland.

The Deutsche Post pension service should be informed of the move two months before departure.

Then you can switch and the pension can be paid without gaps.

Pension: taxes abroad – this is important to note

Here, too, it initially depends on whether you are staying abroad only temporarily or permanently.

For less than six months, nothing changes for tax purposes.

You remain subject to unlimited tax liability in Germany.

If you live permanently abroad, you are subject to limited tax liability in Germany.

This means that the pensioner does not have the basic allowance and the taxable income is taxed from the first euro.

In addition, the advantage of spouse splitting no longer applies and you can no longer claim extraordinary expenses (medical expenses).

However, you can avoid this if you receive more than 90 percent of your income from Germany and apply to the responsible tax office for unlimited tax liability.

Then you can use the basic allowance again.

(Maik Heitmann/wdp)

Source: merkur

All news articles on 2022-05-11

You may like

Life/Entertain 2024-01-30T09:49:18.866Z
Life/Entertain 2024-02-07T18:22:34.739Z
Life/Entertain 2024-02-05T18:12:03.051Z

Trends 24h

News/Politics 2024-03-28T06:04:53.137Z

Latest

© Communities 2019 - Privacy

The information on this site is from external sources that are not under our control.
The inclusion of any links does not necessarily imply a recommendation or endorse the views expressed within them.