Michael LeBlanc

So our son really likes ranch dressing.

So I go in and I get the ranch.

And while I'm in there, Joe approaches me.

He introduced himself.

He said he was a Wall Street Journal reporter and he was profiling expats.

$1,500.

Fifteen.

During COVID, when we were both working from home, we decided we needed a bigger house.

And so we started driving around looking at neighborhoods in L.A.

And it became really complicated because of, you know, school districts and essentially all the places that we liked where there were good schools we couldn't afford.

So it was making the process really complicated.

And so one day I said to Steph, I was like, OK, let's just go big.

If you could live anywhere in the world, where would it be?

So then we researched Portugal, and then six months later, that December, is when we first went to Portugal.

And so a combination of factors, the visa process being what it is, you know, the weather is similar to California, and overall we liked it.

We bought one in Phoenix and one in San Antonio.

After the first one, it was really unsettling.

The second one, Steph was really just beside herself.

She was like, let's homeschool them.

Let's get out of here.