Getting Panamanian residency doesn’t mean you can sell your baked goods at the market or take a salary from your own company. Here’s what each visa — Pensionado, QIV, Friendly Nations, remote worker — actually permits, and what it takes to legally sell something or provide a service.
Every Panama expat forum tells you to rent a year before buying. It’s good advice — but it assumes a spare year and an open calendar, which not everyone has. Here’s the real trade-off between a full year’s lease and the extended, live-like-a-local visits we’ve been doing instead, including a wrinkle in our own household that makes “just rent a year” harder than it sounds.
Panama bank mortgages for foreigners are real — but the age math alone disqualifies many retirees from practical terms. We cover every option: bank mortgages with current rates, developer financing, U.S. HELOC strategies, and the Qualified Investor Visa’s $300,000 threshold closing October 15, 2026. Plus: why we’re still working out our own answer.
Panama doesn’t recognize same-sex marriage — not yours performed in the US, not anyone’s. The Supreme Court settled it in March 2023. Without deliberate planning, your partner inherits nothing when you die: Panama’s intestacy rules direct property to blood family. Here’s what you do about that — wills, corporate structures, foundations, powers of attorney, and how the Qualified Investor Visa constrains title decisions for couples where one partner is pursuing it.