The clever way to invest in ETFs for Expats in Germany

Working in Germany and Retiring in Germany or Abroad: A Guide for Expats

The German saving and pension system is unusually complex. Being an expat, you need targeted and clear advice to help you navigate this complexity. You also require extra flexibility as your situation may change.

At Pensionfriend, our diverse team includes members from about a dozen different nationalities, making us deeply aware of the unique challenges faced by expats. We help you avoid common pitfalls like loss of public pension benefits, poor investments, and inflexible programs. Many of our grateful clients have escaped costly traps thanks to our advice.

To fulfill your needs for clear advice, we decipher the regulations and model them so we can evaluate their relative importance, with the aim to help you maximize your pension while maintaining a high degree of flexibility. 

Our evaluation highlights that the Private Pension Plan is optimal not just for most Germans but especially for expats, given the fundamental flexibility. We have ensured our Private Pension Plan is truly flexible by eliminating both upfront and exit fees, allowing you to withdraw your assets at any time.

Key Benefits:

• Asset Flexibility: You can change your contributions, pause your contributions when you move abroad, add extra contributions any time you want, and cancel or withdraw partially or fully at any time without cost.

• Residence Flexibility: You can continue your contributions from anywhere in the European Economic Area and withdraw from anywhere, provided you use a European bank account. You can also continue to contribute from other countries, provided you have an account in Germany. Discuss your flexibility with other countries with your advisor.

• Collateral for Home Purchase: In case you decide to buy a house in Germany, you can use the assets in the plan as collateral for buying one.

• Tax optimization: Private pensions are nearly always taxed in the country where you reside. You can check the taxation in the country you plan to move to and decide where it is more beneficial to target the payout. Our flexibility offers all the possible solutions!

In addition, Pensionfriend's Private Pension Plan offers:

• Investments by professionals with an unbiased, high-return, low-fee approach

• The ability to set key risk and choice parameters (such as maximum loss)

• Easy change of beneficiaries with no capital gains tax for survivors

• The ability to shop around in or at the start of retirement in Germany to get the best annuity and then get very advantageous tax rates.