The Lonely Side of Retiring Abroad

GRONINGEN, Netherlands — Moving to a sunny coastal town in Portugal or Spain for retirement sounds like a dream come true for many. Retirees are after Mediterranean beaches, affordable living costs, and endless leisure time in a cultural paradise. But behind those smiling social media photos of retired expats sipping sangria, there’s often an untold story unfolding.

Many retirees who move abroad find themselves caught in an unexpected contradiction. While their Instagram feeds showcase beautiful villas and scenic views, their daily reality might include a persistent feeling of disconnection from meaningful social networks.

This gap between expectation and reality is exactly what researchers from the Netherlands have uncovered in a new study published in Psychology and Aging. Their work reveals that people who move to other countries after retirement face a unique type of isolation that many hadn’t bargained for when planning their overseas adventures.

Researchers from the Netherlands Interdisciplinary Demographic Institute took a deep dive into the experiences of nearly 5,000 Dutch retirees who had moved abroad. They compared these international retirement migrants with about 1,300 older Dutch adults who stayed put in the Netherlands. All participants were between 66 and 90 years old.

While the grass might appear greener on the Mediterranean side, retirement migrants reported significantly higher levels of a specific type of loneliness compared to their counterparts who never left home.

They separated loneliness into two categories: emotional and social. Emotional loneliness happens when you lack close, intimate relationships like a partner or best friend. Social loneliness, by contrast, happens when you’re missing that wider social circle and community feeling.

Retirees who moved abroad weren’t more emotionally lonely than those who stayed in the Netherlands. But they were considerably more socially lonely. They felt disconnected from broader social networks, even when they had their spouse or partner with them in their new country.

Many retirees move abroad as couples, so they still have that primary emotional connection. But what they give up, sometimes without fully realizing it, is that wider community web built over decades of living in one place: the neighbors who know your name, the local shopkeeper who remembers your order, the friends from various life chapters who can be counted on for different kinds of support.

As one British expat living in Spain noted in earlier research cited by the authors, friendships formed abroad can feel “superficial and cursory.” The study quotes discussions among British men in Spain who said you “know so little about people’s pasts, that you never know whether they can be trusted, and that one never knows when someone is going to go back to Britain—or when you may lose a friend.”

The study went beyond comparing migrants to non-migrants. It also looked at what factors might protect retirement migrants from experiencing loneliness or put them at higher risk.

Having regular contact with neighbors in their new country and feeling a sense of belonging to their destination helped ward off both types of loneliness. Speaking the local language well and having at least one good friend in the new country specifically reduced social loneliness.

Risk factors included losing contact with good friends back home, which increased both emotional and social loneliness. Losing regular contact with adult children after moving abroad was linked to higher emotional (but not social) loneliness.

Continuing to feel strongly connected to the Netherlands had mixed effects. It was linked to higher emotional loneliness (perhaps through homesickness) but lower social loneliness (perhaps through maintaining a sense of cultural identity).

Rather than discouraging international retirement migration, these findings call for more awareness of the potential pitfalls. Moving abroad after retirement isn’t inherently problematic; many retirees thrive in their new environments. However, understanding the specific challenges can help people prepare better and take steps to maintain connections both old and new.

For those planning retirement abroad, learning the local language, actively seeking neighbor interactions, finding ways to maintain connections with family and friends back home, and being realistic about the time and effort needed to build meaningful new relationships later in life.

From British retirees on Spain’s Costa del Sol to Americans in Mexico and Japanese seniors in Malaysia, more older adults are crossing borders in search of a better quality of life. Loneliness in old age isn’t just an unpleasant feeling; it’s linked to worse health outcomes and higher mortality risk.

Paradise, it turns out, has complications. The sunshine and cheaper living costs in popular retirement destinations are real attractions. But so are the challenges of building a new social world from scratch in later life, often while navigating language barriers and cultural differences. The dream of retirement abroad doesn’t need to be abandoned. But like all dreams worth pursuing, it benefits from a clear-eyed view of both its promises and its pitfalls.