🐧 Expat Net Worth Report Q1 2023

Insights from $127M+ net worth, $50M income, 47 millionaires, 40 countries
Dexter Zhuang
Dexter Zhuang
April 16, 2023

Today in 10 minutes or less, you’ll learn:

  • 🤩 Who were new subscribers in Q1 2023
  • 📈 Net worth and income insights
  • 💎 Asset allocation for Singapore expats

💸 Expat Net Worth Report Q1 2023

At the start of every quarter, I aim to publish a net worth snapshot from the previous quarter’s new subscriber cohort.

My goal is to provide expats with a transparent, up-to-date resource on net worth and income data from their peer group.

As far as I know, you won’t be able to find this data anywhere else (not publicly anyway).

All numbers below are self-reported in USD

🍫 Quick bites

  • 313 expats completed the onboarding survey in Q1 2023*
  • ~$127M aggregate net worth 🤯
  • ~$50M aggregate annual gross income
  • Live in 40 residence countries around the world, hailing from 58 origin countries

*survey created on February 18th

Demographics

Residence countries (top 10)

  1. Singapore
  2. United States
  3. Australia
  4. Canada
  5. Indonesia
  6. Malaysia
  7. United Kingdom
  8. Vietnam
  9. UAE
  10. Netherlands

Origin countries (top 10)

  1. United States
  2. India
  3. Singapore
  4. Australia
  5. Indonesia
  6. Malaysia
  7. United Kingdom
  8. Canada
  9. Hong Kong
  10. France

Age: 83% fall within 25-44 age range, including 56% within 26-34

Gender: 1/3 female, 2/3 male

Financial knowledge: 57% intermediate, 33% beginners, 10% advanced

Net worth

Alright, let’s dive into the juicy stuff.

55% of expats have at least $100k in wealth, while 27% have under $50k.

What surprised me: 15% are millionaires! 🤯

Breakdowns by age, country, gender, knowledge

Net worth by age: Trend is obvious: Older age, higher net worth.

Net worth by countries: Pretty volatile chart honestly.

What was interesting to me: Net worth distribution looks roughly similar across expats in top 5 countries, except Australia.

Net worth by gender: Sadly, within this cohort, women have less wealth than men. I hope to see this change in future cohorts.

Financial knowledge by net worth: Here we can see another trend: Higher net worth correspond with higher levels of financial knowledge.

💡 Asset allocation of Singapore expats

By the way… want to see how other expats break down their assets? Here’s the EXACT breakdown of investments and asset allocation for 75 Singapore expats:

👉️ Singapore Expat Money Report

Income

50%+ of expats are earning $120k / year (or more). I expected this as expats are a high-earning group.

What caught my eye: ~15% are making $600k+ / year ⚡️

🌐 Beyond your borders

🇸🇬 Due to rising rent prices, 7 in 10 firms ready to move Singapore expat staff overseas (Reddit)

🍜 Ramen maker Nissin sales up 41%; also performed well during 2008 recession (FD/Reuters)

🇺🇸 Next wave of US remote work is about outsourcing jobs overseas (WSJ)

🇵🇹 Why the “Robinhood of Passports” says it’s a mistake to ban Portugal golden visas (BI)

🇮🇳 India and China in dispute over blocking each other’s journalist visas (NHKJapan)

🇺🇦 Ukraine's Foreign Minister welcomes suggestion that Russian athletes could be denied visas (ITG)

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📆 How I can help

That’s all for today!

Whenever you’re ready, here’s how I can help you:

1. Monetize Your Expertise (free) - Click here to receive my free, 5-day course teaching you the foundations of monetizing your expertise outside of your day job.

2. Part-Time Consulting Launchpad - Click to join the waitlist for my January 2025 cohort. This teaches the system I used to earn 6-figures from my consulting side hustles taking 10 hours/week.

3. Tools I use and recommend - Discover my favorite tools for my personal finances and remote business.

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Dexter Zhuang

Dexter is the founder of Money Abroad, an online education platform that helps people shift from "live to work" to "work to live." He writes about money, portfolio careers, and life design. Starting his career in San Francisco, he has lived and worked across Southeast Asia and Latin America for the past 6 years. He has 10+ years of experience building products and teams at public companies (Dropbox) and scaling startups (Xendit). His work has been featured in global outlets like Business Insider, CBS, US News & World Report, and Tech in Asia. He graduated from Dartmouth College.

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