Moving advice needed urgently

Scott, I will attempt to address some of your queries:
1. Travel to Scotland--Travel to Europe, I have found, is best accomplished by flying on a direct to JFK (NYC) (3.5 hour flight), then connecting to your cross-Atlantic flight. There are significantly greater options to Europe out of JFK. The other option is to find an airline that might have in-season charters coming to the Caribbean (maybe to one of the former colonies?) and hopping over to that island to connect. For example, my family is visiting from the Netherlands. They hopped a charter from Amsterdam to St. Maarten, then took an inter-Caribbean airliner to St. Thomas.
2. Mortgages and mimimum deposits--First Bank offers loans with only 5% down. I do not know what, if any, limitations there are for foreigners. However, when we applied for our mortgage we had to provide residency information. You should also consider looking in to the British Virgin Islands, I imagine it may be easier to purchase property there.
3. Maximum stays-- I believe as a UK resident you fall under the visa waiver program, which entitles you to visits without a visa for a maximum of 90 days. However, you are not allowed to utilize this program if your intent is to permanently reside in the US and you must have a return ticket.
4. Employment--You are fortunate in that St. Croix has an oil refinery, so your skills are easily transferrable. I do not, however, know what prospects there are for foreign applicants. I advise checking out this website and inquiring of Human Resources Dept.: http://www.hess.com/hovensa/default.htm.

As you can see, many of the questions you asked do not have pat answers. You will need to do a lot of research, before you contemplate investing in a home. Feel free to come back and ask more questions. GOOD LUCK!

I'm not an expert on US immigration laws but if you are not a US citizen or a Resident Alien (have a US Green Card) you will be subject to the same restrictions that you would if you were immigrating to the mainland US. That is, you will not be allowed to work or live without a special visa (I believe they call it a B-1 Visa and they are difficult to get as you must be sponsored by a potential employer who must demonstrate you have a unique skill that cannot be filled by a US citizen. As I understand the process (I had a friend from England who went through it - unsucceeefully I might add) you have to apply for and acually get your B-1 Visa before actually coming to the US to live and work. The B-1 has to be renewed periodically and eventually expires.

You may enter the country on a visitor's visa which will allow you to stay for "in country" for only a limited amout of time before you have to leave. The timing allowed under the visitor's visas are designed specifially to deter anyone who is not a US citizen from living in the US on a "full time" basis. This applies to all members of a family so that in your case even if you travelled "in and out" on a regular basis your family members would have to do that also. You should also be aware that if an individual with a visitor's visa is caught working in the US they are subject to deportation and will be barred from getting a B-1 Visa at anytime in the future and possibibly denied entry to the country on a visitor's visa. My friend ran afoul of these regulations and had to return to England.

You are dealing with a very complex set of regulations so I would not rely soley on information you get on forums such as this. It would be very wise for you to check with an attorney who specializes in US immigration laws or at the very least visit the US Consulate in your home country (they are well versed in the US immigration laws) before making any decisions as you do not want to make an investment of this magnitude if the end result will not serve your purpose. Also, if you do a google search I'm sure you will find the address for the official US Government web-site that will provide you with accurate information concerning the immigration process. Lastly, as an citizen of the UK you might find it easier to relocate to one of the British Virgin Islands - just a thought!

Scott:

You can make good connections for London via Miami.

You can leave St Croix mid afternoon for Miami then connect for an over night flight to London.

Another option you might want to look at if your schedule matches up with the non stop charter flight flying bi-weekly from Copenhagen to STX. Depending on exchange rates about $US 1,100 round trip.

Jim

Scott,

Flagstar Bank, a national lender that I believe is the only national (i.e. not USVI or Carribean only) sources for a mortgage, is another option. Ask for Michael Armandariz, who did our mortgage and worked as much as possible through calls , fax and email.

340-773-8100 or michael.armendariz@flagstar.com

Have you spent time on STX before? I would STRONGLY advise you not buy property here without seeing it youself. The listings can be VERY misleading (there is a house listed in a great area that we loved on paper but discovered was the home of squatters, had termite holes in its wooden roof, and would need at least $100k in repairs in order to become liveable -- not to mention that no one had mowed the property in the last 6 months). We found another we saw and considered was in an area that we considered less safe, and a third was really far from everything we needed/wanted to access.

If you do decide to purchase, hire an STX based real estate lawyer first (ours, Felice Quigley, was a pitbull in protecting our interests), and hire everyone related to the sale like the home inspector, pest inspector, yourself -- do not rely on any reqal estate agent to do it for you. The agents down here feel they are employed by the seller -- we almost learned the hard way (thank you Felice!) that this means they might hire an inspector who "misses" any major issues that might jeopardize the sale (and their commission).

Wish you all the best -- we sure understand your dream and encourage you to go for it with careful planning that makes it go smoothly for you.

HC
HC

Wow !!!!!!

Thanks Guys and Gals for the superb feedback!!!!

I have a lot of things to work on now, i head the warnings on immigration and inspectors etc, thank you all for the insight.

The property which has caught my attention is linked below, anyone knowing of it's exact location and distance to schools etc?

http://208.39.189.68/Real_Estate/US_Virgin_Islands/Single_Family_Homes/

I will also have a look at the British Virgin Islands as suggested.

A huge thank you again for taking the time to reply, it must be island life it makes you all so friendly!!!!

Regards

Scott

Scott,

Without a picture, it's very hard to tell, but I can tell you there is a house that appears on the STX real estate preview program that has many features that are also listed in this description. It's the spiral staircase up to the loft dressing area that triggered my memory. That house is one of the few homes on that show that had interior photos. If it is the place I'm thinking of (a BIG if), it's located in Enfield Green, a gated community on the southern side of the island. The interior looked pretty nice from the photos used -- nice, open floor plan for kitchen/LR/DR, big bathrooms, the narrow and steep spiral stair case up to the loft dressing area, bright white tile. But again I have to warn you that photos don't show everything. The house we bought was on that show a lot (it appeared for 6 weeks after we had moved in!), and the show pics made our house look marvelous inside and out even though it needs a LOT of work (everything from total rewiring to major roof repairs - but that, and desperate sellers, is why we got it at such a bargain price.)

I notice every time I drive by Enfield Green or see photos of properties listed there that there don't seem to be many/any mature trees in the neighborhood. All the yareds look neat and nicely kept, and I have seen some small trees/bushes in yards in EG, but for the most part it looks like there isn't a lot of shade there. Perhaps there really are a lot of trees but they're back out of view from the entrance, or is my perception fairly accurate?

HC

Contrary to what HipCrip says I would not recommend Felice Quigley to represent me in a real estate transaction.

She may be a bull dog with lots of bark, but what you really want is someone that can efficently get a deal done and closed.

She represented a client that I purchased a piece of property from. She did nothing that I am aware of to get the documents pulled together on a timely basis needed for closing. Her client ended up having to pay eight years of property taxes for the second time because they didn't have the documentation to show that they had paid them the first time.

When we finally got to the day of closing and it was held up because of a minor problem in funding my loan, Felice sent directly to me a threatening e-mail which was mostly bull **** boiler plate. This was the first and only time Felice was heard from. The correct way to handle the issue, if Felice wanted to make an issue out of it, was to communicate through my local attorney. Attorney's are not supposed to make official communications with individuals who are represented by an attorney in a legal proceeding.

Look elsewhere for an attorney who will get your deal done in a professional and time efficent manner. You want a deal facilitator not a deal killer

Jim

JIm,

Sorry to hear that you had a bad experience with Felice acting as the agent for the seller, where you're right -- taking a bulldog approach probably isn't the best way to get a deal done.

However, as buyers who were not physically present and who clearly didn't have anyone else looking out for them ("our" real estate agent tried to amend our contract to read "sold as is, where is" at the last minute -- which would mean that anything found in an inspection, like our bad roof that was "overlooked" in the home inspection process, isn't grounds for cancelling the sale or making adjustments in the selling price -- and had the nerve to tell us to our face that "as is where is" just meant the seller didn't want to have to paint anything or make minor repairs), that same pitbull who was a bad idea for selling is exactly what these remote buyers wanted and needed, even after we got down here and were still trying to deal with property tax payments.

Shows why it's best to hire the personality and skills that best fit your circumstances, to not take the opinion of just one person who refers you, and to check several references on your own before deciding to hire anyone to do work on your behalf.

HC