Would you retire to a Middle Eastern playground if you could?

[GiveUsThisDayOurDailyPizza]

For example UAE, Qatar

I will probably never be a high net worth individual anyway but even if I was I can’t imagine choosing to spend my retirement years in such places.

Work and live there for a few years to get ahead financially, yes, or a long layover on the way to somewhere else but what makes so many UK expats want to retire there?

This is prompted by something that came up at work. I’d love to understand the appeal as I have to interact with people for whom this is a long term ambition or plan.

Oh, absolutely!

It's quite comical to see people race to be the first to say they'd just HATE it 🙄

I’d hardly describe Qatar as a ME playground. It’s a world away from Dubai.

No desire to work or desire there. It’s the old FILTH syndrome: Failed In London Try Hong Kong (or Dubai).

Nope. I had to go there for business once and I hated it.

Very True

Back in the Day, and even in my youth (70s), Beirut was known as "the Paris of the Middle East" with its little street cafes and tables set outside etc.
Tripoli was also a popular holiday choice at that time for those able to afford it

No.

I wouldn't even go on holiday to somewhere that had a dubious attitude to human rights, never mind go and live there.

desire there

*Retire there

You wouldn't even legally be allowed to retire there... no job means no sponsorship so no residency.... purely baseless and slightly racist thread... get your facts straight before starting a pointless discussion people

Jesus. It’s abundantly clear how many people on these threads have never spent any real time in the Middle East or even GCC states, but are still armchair experts.

What makes you think lots of British expats retire in the UAE or Qatar? I would say it’s a tiny, tiny number. I’ve been in the UAE nearly two decades and it’s borderline unheard of. (If anything, the UAE is trying to appeal to that demographic with very limited success.) You’d need serious private health insurance, to own your property to secure a visa, and you’d want to stay somewhere else six months a year due to the heat. Qatar is even less likely. It has a fraction of the infrastructure the UAE has.

The UAE had a mega visa shake-up during and after Covid, so there are pathways now. It’s not as specifically job linked as it was.

Well , the club, tennis, the pool , the golf course, your boat, speed or sail, water skiing, diving, deep sea fishing - terrible retirement 😂

My inlaws very fondly remember it.

Cornwall, France, Italy, Belgium....

The human rights problem is catastrophic in places like Qatar because it's engineered. Government is rich and deliberately exploits poor migrants. Places like India have areas which are poor due to lack of resources. It's not quite on par with the systematic exploitation, right along side massive wealth, of ME

It's a question that was asked, people are answering it.

@Schroedingersimmigrant it was similar in Damascus too - beautiful place. The current situations in both Syria and Lebanon are tragic.

Definitely not, I wouldn’t even go on holiday there. Vile, fake places without basic respect for human rights

I've never heard of this . Could you explain it please ?

I don't think many people do retire from the UK to the Middle East, but I suppose a hot climate and cheap servants might appeal to some.

No but would definitely consider Portugal. Warm, close to home, tax efficient

Also Cuba? South Africa since they’ve been supporting Russia in the war against Ukraine?

I do some work for a company that markets —independent advice— investment products to wealthy expat retirees. People definitely do retire from the UK to Qatar (which is keen to market itself as another ME playground for HNIs and UHNIs) and the UAE, and my interaction with them is in the form of writing lengthy copy about financial products that may be of interest.

I am just trying to understand the appeal over, say, the rest of the world.

My idea of hell.

And the inflation. Lebanon is proper suffering. The food costs are astronomical. Such a shame.

‘Vile, fake places without basic respect for human rights’. exactly this.

I have a gay son. I’d rather stick rusty pins in both eyes.

Absolutely not for ethical and moral reasons. The current trend of Dubai as a destination for hen parties leaves me a bit 🤮 the absurdity and irony of these young woman usually with white half arsed covered bikini’s in the freedom of a hotel is not lost on me but obviously lost on them.