Retired, but moving abroad? - Yahoo! Finance
You worked your whole life, contributing to Social Security, and now want to retire outside the United States – but can you receive your Social Security payments while living abroad? Well, usually yes, unless you move to one of several countries in the world where payments cannot be sent, most notoriously Cuba and North Korea. The rules are considerably more forgiving for U.S. citizens who move to another country, and restrictions are in place for non-citizens who decide to move abroad, but generally if you’ve earned U.S. Social Security benefits you’ll be able to collect them if you move to all but a small list of foreign places. In addition to Cuba and North Korea, there are 8 other countries in which you may not be able to receive U.S. benefits unless you get an exception which may impose payment conditions. And non-citizens may be required to periodically return to the U.S. to continue to get benefits. All of this is discussed in this Yahoo! Finance article by Vance Cariage, but the easiest way to see if you can receive U.S. Social Security payments while living outside the U.S. is to use Social Security’s online “Payments Abroad Screening Tool” found at this link: www.ssa.gov/international/payments_outsideUS.html