JC – Retirement Survival Expert, Author and Keynote Speaker
Living in paradise 13 Years and counting!
Starting as a teenager delivering boats to exotic Caribbean islands, I got the taste for travel and adventure. Then I settled down, started businesses of my own and traveled for 12 years working for the biggest Personal Success 
Coach in the industry and Best Selling Author as his personal security staying in some of the finest hotels on the planet.
My journey so far in life has been on a path. From the time I was old enough to be on my own I have been in love with different cultures and people. I set out on my lifetime adventure as a teenager delivering boats to the Caribbean and Central America. During this period I witnessed amazing and happy people that didn’t have all the luxuries that the people back home had but were very happy and generous none the less. During those times of travel and adventure I realized that this could be a lifestyle, and not a costly one at that. I went out and bought my own classic sailboat, a Seabird Yawl and set off on a life of adventure and experience and have never looked back.
My experiences from exporting cars while living in Costa Rica, to importing emeralds from Brazil while being married to my Brazilian wife, my travels have taken me far and wide. During all these adventures I realized that to have an incredible life you could either work harder or spend less. I chose the latter.
Why? Because I worshipped my free time and freedom. It gave me time to get more of what I felt was most important in life; the connections to many people and many cultures.
When it came to working, I have always loved and admired the freelance lifestyle and worked as a photojournalist and videographer for quite a while, which allowed me to have both freedom and adventure. I felt like I was really living a jet-setting lifestyle on a beer budget. I realized the cost wasn’t any more sitting having a coffee in Rio than it was at a high end coffee shop back home. In fact, it was a lot cheaper! I always asked myself, “why can I do this and not others?”
Good fortune again smiled on me when I started as a staff member for the Best Selling Author and Peak Performance Coach, Anthony Robbins. We became good friends and I had the privilege of traveling around the world with him as a member on his personal security team for twelve years. It was great to stay in 5 Star hotels and live the so-called “good life”. While hanging out in a hammock at Tony’s Fijian Resort, Namale, I realized how important something I learned from Tony was. It was the power of beliefs. The reason my life was the way it was, boiled down to my set of beliefs and rules for being happy and fulfilled and I felt I could pass some of these on and teach these distinctions to anybody.
Then thirteen years ago the need to set out on my own and head off to see the big world hit again. My travels took me to to Southeast Asia where I fell in love with the region. I got amazed at the costs and lifestyle available that fit my budget and the scenery, the food and the people made me feel alive again.
The values the Southeast Asia people showed me that were important in their lives were also more in-line with the way I feel and think and they way I want to live my life. Also the cost of living compared to the States was amazing. So about 13 years ago I made the decision and semi-retired at the age of 45. I packed up and moved to someplace where you can talk to complete strangers and get a smile instead of a sneer. Where the point of living, IS living. And living in peace, not living in fear. Since then I have returned back only occasionally for speaking engagements or to see family. I also did go back occasionally to help make a difference in the lives of people in crisis after natural disasters like hurricane Katrina by working as a subcontractor for FEMA.
A few years ago I returned again to my home country. It had been over two years since I had been back in the States and what I saw scared the hell out of me. Many friends, family and people I met were struggling to make ends meet and just putting food on the table and gas in the car was causing a lot of distress. Heaped on top of that was paying their mortgages, taxes and insurance and I saw many people were buried in debt. The pulse of life in these people were flat-lining.
People who once thought I was a little weird moving half way around the world were now saying it was a pretty smart thing I had done. When I tell people the rent on my 2 bedroom house is only $200 and my meals only cost $1.25 and I spend $3.00 a week on fuel to get around. Their ears pick up. I made a point to ask a question to each and every one of the people I came in contact with on that trip back home. And their answers then changed the direction of my life at that moment. My question was, “What quality of life are you going to live in a few years when you retire and have to live off your dwindled investments and your measly retirement check?” The answer I kept hearing was, “I don’t know”. At that moment I realized that the focus of my life was to resuscitate people’s love and passion for living.
Even now when I think about how many people are suffering this fate of retirement poverty and how many more will be in this same sinking boat in the future and KNOWING how well they could live elsewhere in the world, my purpose is clear.
Knowing my purpose I set off to help the people facing retirement challenges. At that time when I tried to explain to people their retirement lifestyle options they just couldn’t conceive what style of life they could get for the costs I was telling them were available. And when I looked to the internet to show them confirmation of what I was telling them it only made things worse. Blogs had became debates and arguments as to whether it was possible or not to live off the equivalent of 500 USD. So I decided to show people like you exactly what you can expect. This is how RetireCheap.Asia got created. I hope you find value in what I show you. I want to help you to realize one thing in life is always a fact. “There’s ALWAYS an option”. No mater what is happening in your life hang in there and we will get you to a place you are comfortable, at peace and content. Because that’s what you deserve!
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JC Retirement Survival Expert Available for keynote speaking engagements and consultations on the subject of Retirement Survival Abroad – How to get the most out of a retirement budget.
