F.A.Q./Living in Argentina

• How much does it cost to live in Argentina?

The cost of living in Argentina depends on your lifestyle. A reasonable minimum for a single person who plans to rent a room in a house would be around US$700 per month — buskers, squatters and those who really live on the edge could probably get away with a little less. A safer bet would be to budget for US$1000 per month for someone if you are planning to take classes, go to museums, eat out once in a while and to have some extra cash on hand in case of an emergency.

If you don’t plan to travel much, expect to pay US$300 per month on housing to rent a room in a shared house or apartment in a major city. Those who want to rent their own apartment will certainly need considerably more and should expect to spend around US$700 on housing per month plus a deposit of equal value. It’s worth noting that the Argentine government considers AR$2,000 per month (US$ 522/€382/AUD$593/CAD$555) an adequate amount to reside here — that’s what they require retirees to demonstrate as proof that they can afford to live here without mooching off the government. In July 2010 the ‘rentista visa’, which is awarded to those who can provide proof of a monthly investment income, jumped from the previous requirement of AR$2,500 per month (US$ 655 or €477) to $AR$8,000 (US$ 2,028 or €1,575)  per month, making it unaccessible to many who previous qualified.

Of course, if you want to eat in the most fashionable restaurants every night, take weekend trips to Mendoza and Punte del Este, own a car (or always take cabs), get a little nip and tuck here and there and live in a beautiful classic building overlooking the city, you could easily spend up to $US 3,000-4,000 per month and live like royalty.

• Can I make a living teaching English there?

If you are a native English speaker without a strong regional accent you can teach English in Argentina, even if you don’t have TEFL certification (although having it helps, if only moderately). Make a living? If it’s your only source off income it will be a challenge unless you stay a while and really work it. Look at it more as a short-term way to make a modest income — only the most dedicated people seem to have the wherewithal to make it a profession. It’s certainly not like teaching English in China or South Korea, where you can actually save some decent money. Unless it’s your personal passion, you might want to consider finding something more profitable to do if you plan on staying here a while.

• What about visas?

We’ve outlined information about tourist visas here, but what happens if you want to stay in Argentina longer than six months? One option that many ‘perma-tourists’ (as those who don’t pursue residency are called) choose is to take the boat ride over to Uruguay in order to get a new entrance stamp every three months. Many people do this for years without a problem, but you never know — especially in Argentina. Sometimes a passport full of stamps in and out of the country throws up the red flags and in a rare cases, people caught doing this are ordered to get the ball rolling on their residency papers or leave the country. Currently the government is cracking down on those who renew their tourists visas over and over again, although it depends on a few factors such as the number of renewals, the nationality of the violator and by all appearances, the mood of the immigration official. Anecdotal evidence leads us to believe that long-term perma-tourists with non-EU passports are more vulnerable to being hassled.

In addition to the new visa fees for some tourists, the penalty for overstaying a tourist visa was raised significantly in 2009, from AR$50 to AR$300 pesos, paid on the way out.

Those who get sick of the day trips to Uruguay sometimes chose to simply overstay their visa and pay the fine on the way out of the country. It is the most painless and cost effective option (but you didn’t hear it from us.) There are those who are uncomfortable with living as, essentially, ‘illegal aliens’ but we haven’t yet heard of any cases of people being forbidden to reenter the country for overstaying their visa.

There are variety of opinions about this topic among foreigners in Buenos Aires, but those who go to Uruguay every three months to renew their visas over a period of years are basically advertising that they’re bending the rules, and you can’t blame immigrations officers for wondering why someone from a developed nation would do that for years on end without legalizing. Certainly the thousands of Ukrainians, Chinese and Africans who overstay their tourist visas in Argentina are not taking a boat to Uruguay every three months for a new stamp.

After living in Argentina for years one learns that playing by the official rules and trying to do things ‘correctly’ doesn’t always work in one’s favor, however illogical. That trait can be rather endearing, especially in this case.

• Okay then, what about getting papers that allow me to legally reside in Argentina?

There are a number of options to receive residency in Argentina, among them the pensioner visa, student visa, work visa, investor visa, religious visa and via marriage or childbirth. If money is not a problem, you can just contact a lawyer who will walk you through the steps and take care of the paperwork. Depending on what country you come from it may be easier to do the paperwork in your home country. The best way to figure it out for your particular case is to simple call the Argentine embassy in your country.

If you are already in Argentina and speak Spanish a much cheaper, albeit more frustrating option, is to simply go to the immigrations office, take a number, explain your desire to reside in the country and ask what would be the easiest way for you to get a visa. Some may find that their monthly pension income is sufficient to get them residency or that enrolling in some classes will permit them to get a student visa. We were pleasantly surprised in 2004, when after hearing how difficult it would be to get a visa that there was actually a free-for-all legalization program in place to legalize all the Chinese, Ukrainians and yes, even gringos residing in the country without the proper paperwork. That program has now been rotated to only apply to those of Mercosur countries, but it will probably be reinstated at some point for other nationalities.

To receive any type of visa you will need a notarized copy of your birth certificate, your criminal records from your home country, a copy of your fingerprints and a copy of your criminal record in Argentina (or lack therein — you can get both at your local police station along with a ‘certificate of residence,’ which will later delivered by a police officer to your home) four passport photos and the processing fee, which starts at US$100. Depending on the type of visa you are seeking, you may also need to present financial paperwork, a health certificate and open a local bank account.

The bottom line is that Argentina is a huge country with a relatively small population; as long as you’re not a hardened criminal they probably will let you stay if you jump through all the hoops. In practice, things aren’t always efficient or easy, but if you have the wherewithal and patience to get a visa you can probably find a way to do it.

Keep in mind that, that unless you have a really good lawyer doing your paperwork for you, you will inevitably experience a few headaches along the way. Once it is all over though, five years after receiving your National Identity Card (DNI), you can apply for Argentine citizenship.

• Can I survive as a travel writer in Argentina?

This is another question we get a lot. It’s quite optimistic or perhaps completely unrealistic to think you can simply move to Argentina and start making a living as a travel writer if you don’t have prior experience. You can always try — you will certainly be in good company. Just make sure you have an adequate amount of money saved up before you move here. Many of the local English publications and websites do have internship programs but you’ll usually need your own equipment and you won’t make any money. If you have previous published clips you can definitely pitch articles to the ever-shrinking numbers of travel publications out there, just keep in mind, there are a lot of people trying to do the same thing. If you are one of the few skilled scribes in Argentina writing for high-paying glossy publications such as Condé Nast, then life is good.

• Can I start a business in Argentina?

Those with an entrepreneurial vision will probably find that Argentina has a lot of room for new businesses that import good ideas and quality of product and service. Figuring out what kind of business would do well here is just a matter of living in the country a while and seeing what products or services are needed.

For example, a whole foods café and juice bar in the heart of San Telmo would be a good bet while opening a steakhouse or a bakery similar to those throughout the city would be a bit redundant. We can deduce that a microbrew would do very well — there are only a few beers available in the country and the micro-brew beers that do exist have limited distribution. Love it or hate it, even Starbucks, which came into the country in 2007 seems to be doing well despite charging prices equivalent to what the average Argentine earns in one hour for a coffee drink. Why? We suspect it’s because no one else offers such specialized coffee drinks or the ‘cozy atmosphere’ where once can sit down on a couch and read the paper. Novelty alone isn’t self-sustaining though — a consistent level of quality will keep people coming back.

Similarly, creating much needed jobs while taking advantage of lower labor costs to provide services for overseas clients will put any business at an advantage.

Starting a business in Argentina will be a paperwork headache similar to getting residency. There are 15 paperwork procedures totaling around $AR 2,000 that need to be completed in order to start a business, you can see them outlined on this very helpful website.

Once again the easiest way to go about it would be to hire a good lawyer to help you complete these steps, if that’s not an option you may want to consider whether you have enough capital and/or vigor to start a business in the first place.

Once the paperwork is out of the way, many of the foreign business owners we’ve met seem quite happy with their businesses. The challenges for business owners aren’t over once everything is up and running though. Among the ongoing problems — none of the unique to Argentina— are: finding and retaining good employees, enforcing contracts (the courts are very slow and not practical for minor disputes) robbery and possible shakedowns by corrupt police. To get a realistic idea of what you’re in for, it’s a good idea to talk at length to other business owners about their experiences.

Argentina is open for business, there is money to be made, there are plenty of people who want jobs – just be sure to get a very good handle on the lay of the land before you undertake the challenge.

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