Americans Seeking Argentine Residency In Record Numbers
Since 2000 a whopping 24,626 Americans have sought residency in Argentina, according to the latest data from the Dirección Nacional de Migraciones obtained by The Argentine Post.
Last year alone 4,173 U.S. citizens filed to become either temporary or permanent residents here. That’s a record for one year, and it’s up more than 10% from 2007.
But these figures represent only the number of Americans who have sought formal residence. The number who are living here informally on tourists visas is unknown but certain to be many times higher.
It’s very hard to know how many people – American or otherwise – fall into this latter category, says Migraciones Spokesman Hugo Moujan.
Between January and mid April of this year, some 172,256 Americans came to Argentina, immigration data show. Most of those people arrived for short trips as tourists. It’s not clear how many stayed beyond the 90 days permitted by the typical tourist visa.
During that period another 36,354 Canadians arrived in the country, as did 22,371 Australians, to mention arrivals from just a couple of just a couple of English-speaking countries. British and Irish visitors were harder to separate because their arrivals were mixed in with others from Western European countries.
Americans rank 5th on the immigration scale, behind China and – way behind – Peru, Bolivia and Paraguay, in that order. Paraguay was easily the No. 1 source of immigration between 2000 and 2008, accounting for 33.5% of all migrants.
Americans accounted for just 2.58% of immigrants during the period.
If you’re an immigrant or have an immigration experience you’d like to share, please let us know or feel free to comment in the comments section.
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We’re two of those numbers as we finally applied in December 2008. We’re now in tramite and will hopefully be approved in June. I have yet to blog about this whole experience, but I want to because I really don’t want to come across as *yet another* whiny norte-americana complaining about the inefficiencies of the Argentine bureaucratic process. I know that it is a lot easier for us to immigrate here than it is for Argentines to immigrate to the USA, so I keep that in mind when talking about this process. We want to be totally in blanco here because we want to support our adopted country and I personally think that there is nothing more patriotic that a person can do than pay their fair share and their taxes. People (both Argentines and expats alike) look at us like we’re crazy when we say we’re going through this whole process, but we want to be here without any bureaucratic hassles on down the line.
good for you Beatrice! i feel you and hope that it all comes down successfully for you and your mate. Sicnerely, Martin
VERY GOOD EXAMPLE Beatrice, that’s the way to go. Congrats to you and your partner.
I am going thru the immigration process now and have some help with a service. I have turned in all my paperwork and they will meet in immigration tomorrow. I am going to get my paperwork that show my Permanent DNI is in progress. This started three weeks ago using this service. They said I can get my Permanent DNI in two months with there help. So I will keep you updated to my progress and there is a service fee for there help. They are charging me 1200 US but no money exchanges hands only when I get paperwork from immigration. Then I paid them 700 US and the balance when I get my Permanent DNI. They have been with me thru the whole process. They do most of the Talking for you so it has seem to make thing go faster. I will let you know if this all works out.
We have been en trámite 4 years and counting. I can’t think of a better way to spend my time. Thanks for posting.
[...] in downtown Buenos Aires during a public celebration of Israel’s 61st anniversary. Sunday, 17 May Americans Seeking Argentine Residency In Record Numbers[The Argentine Post] Since 2000 a whopping 24,626 Americans have sought residency in Argentina… [...]
This is no surprise to us. My wife and I vacationed in Argentina for 3-months beginning last May 2008.
We rented an apartment in Buenos Aires, in the beautiful Recoleta neighborhood. Then, we used the apartment as a home base to travel and enjoy 4 and 5 day separate trips to Mendoza, Bariloche, Salta, and throughout Patagonia to El Calafate, hiking on Glacier Moreno and El Chalten, hiking Mt. Fitzroy. Another trip to Ushuaia, the southern most City in the world was exciting. We love beautiful Argentina.
Our travels to Mexico and Florida are over. For us it’s further South and back to Argentina, December 2008, January and February, 2009 to get away from NYC’s cold winter months.
The USA $$$$ is strong in Argentina compared to the PESO. One reason we opted for South America instead of heading to Europe where the USA $$$$ is weak compared to an inflated Euro and expensive rental properties and hotels. Also, the weather — opposite the weather in the USA, was like being in Florida during the Argentine winter months — warm and sunny.
We met a lot of Americans and Canadians too in Buenos Aires and throughout our travels except in Patagonia — surprisingly not many Americans but a lot of French all over Patagonia. Almost every traveler we met had something nice to say about their travels in Argentina, the warm and friendly people. We enjoyed our three months in Buenos Aires, living and shopping with the Portenos, whose pace and traffic was almost close to Manhattan’s. The Americans we met living in retirement in Buenos Aires had only one complaint — it’s hard to get fresh fish. Um…it’s cow country.
Michael Zullo, Upper Eastside, Manhattan
I have been considering moving to Buenos Aires. Getting my residency/citizenship should be quick, since both my parents are argentine citizens. However, my concern is regarding education. Does anyone know if Argentina accepts or recognizes college degrees from the US? If I move there, I would like to be able to work (my field is clinical laboratory sciences). Any suggestions? I’ve emailed the Argentine consulate, they told me to talk to the Ministerio de Education, which still haven’t replied to my email…
Ok- here’s another question… how do you deal with the high crime rate? I can’t count the number of times myself or relatives there have been mugged!
Thanks!
Rebecca:
En mis 53 casi 54 años de vida en la Argentina me han tratado de robar en una sola oportunidad cuando tenía 19 años. Tengo amigos y camaradas de mi misma edad que no han pasado siquiera por una sola mala experiencia. Estimo que si uno es una víctima frecuente es más por torpeza propia que por el aumento de la tasa de criminalidad.
Asi que como a vos te asaltaron una sola vez quiere decir que la tasa de criminalidad no pudo haber aumentado? Ese es el unico argumento que tenes? Mmmmm Sin ofender, me parece que sos de esos que niegan los problemas a no ser que les toque a ellos en carne propia… Lamento desilusionarte pero con el gran numero de crimenes que se suceden a diario tu comentario es un poco dificil de creer… Unicamente alguien que vive en una burbuja diria lo que vos dijiste. O sino, alguien que oculta la realidad en pos de una agenda politica…. Vos decime en cual de los dos grupos estas….
Concuerdo completamente con Carlos, lo que decís Juan es ridiculo, no te podes guiar unicamente por tu propia experiencia. A mi nunca me robaron, pero conozco a muchos que han sido robados, y no por “propia torpeza.” No laburas en el indec vos?