US Citizenship

[Titan2]

Originally Posted by undercoverbrother

What the #### are you on about?

My family moved to Canada when I was 5, this country has been great out family, except it could be hotter.

I have had great opportunities here in fact my compensation has increased every year, but 1 which was a self imposed lifestyle choice.

Originally Posted by Shazam

Your anecdotal experience is irrelevant. I'm sure you've had "great" opportunities. Are they $500K great? Well I'm going to say no.

Yeah UCB. Your anecdotal evidence is irrelevant. My anecdotal evidence, however, is ironclad and conclusive.

[WideReceiver]

Why?

Not worth it.

[CroFlames]

Originally Posted by WideReceiver

Why?

Not worth it.

Clearly worth it for OP for the reasons listed in the thread.

Typically not worth it for Americans living abroad though.

[Slava]

I thought I would chime in on the people talking about renouncing. The base cost is $3000 or whatever is paid to the consulate. But, you also have to have the past 5 years of taxes filed and caught up, so if you haven't been doing those every year, the cost to renounce is a lot more than $3k. It's $1000/$1500 per year for those filings, plus whatever you would owe there. Depending on whether you will do this all yourself (not the tax filings, but the preparations to renounce), you would be closer to $20k if you hired a lawyer and did things that way.

The other factor is that many people want to renounce, and you're looking at a couple of years' waiting time to get an appointment in Calgary. You could go to a consulate elsewhere and make a trip out of this.