Research process · updated 2026-09-21

Methodology

How Global Home Atlas scores global property destinations across lifestyle, ownership clarity, yield realism, retirement fit, liquidity, and value.

Model10 dimensions
Destinations37
Listings75 samples
Updated2026-09-21
Methodology 10-dimension destination score

Destinations are compared across lifestyle, access, ownership clarity, regulatory safety, yield realism, capital upside, retirement fit, liquidity, foreigner fit, and value entry.

Research standard Independent destination intelligence

Representative listings anchor market texture. They are not offers, availability guarantees, brokerage placements, or paid destination promotion.

Update cadence Regenerated with current source data

Scores, caveats, and benchmark evidence should be treated as shortlist inputs, then verified with local legal, tax, immigration, and property advisers.

What the Score Measures

Global Home Atlas uses a 10-dimension decision model to compare property destinations for buyers who care about lifestyle, legal clarity, rental realism, retirement optionality, and long-term exit quality. The model is deliberately practical: it rewards places that can be lived in, rented responsibly, owned with confidence, and sold into a real buyer pool.

  • Lifestyle magnetism: Natural setting, food culture, and repeatable year-round reasons to be there. Base weight 10%.
  • Global access: Airport quality, regional connectivity, and access to global business centres. Base weight 10%.
  • Ownership clarity: Foreign-buyer pathway, title transparency, transaction practicality, and legal friction. Base weight 12%.
  • Regulatory safety: Short-term-rental and local operating rules that can affect income durability. Base weight 8%.
  • Rental profit: Net-yield potential after operating friction, seasonality, and realistic asset selection. Base weight 13%.
  • Capital upside: Long-term appreciation drivers, scarcity, infrastructure, and demand migration. Base weight 9%.
  • Retirement fit: Healthcare, convenience, safety, comfort, and the ability to live there for months. Base weight 11%.
  • Exit liquidity: Depth and quality of the resale buyer pool when the thesis changes. Base weight 9%.
  • Foreigner fit: Ease for global and Chinese-speaking buyers across language, services, and local acceptance. Base weight 7%.
  • Value entry: Price discipline, USD/m2 reasonableness, and margin of safety at acquisition. Base weight 11%.

How to Use the Score

The score is a shortlist tool, not a purchase instruction. It helps compare destinations on a consistent basis, then forces the buyer to investigate the local legal, tax, financing, building, and neighborhood questions that decide the actual transaction.

Weights are visible because different buyers should be able to challenge the model. A retirement buyer may raise healthcare and convenience. A pure investor may raise yield and exit liquidity. A lifestyle buyer may raise access and year-round activity.

Acquisition-cost comparison standard

The baseline models a nonresident foreign individual: cash · second home · completed resale · no reliefs. It assumes direct personal ownership where the purchase route is legally plausible.

Every destination uses the fixed 100 m² retirement-home archetype (Indicative 100 m² retirement home). The base total includes only buyer-side costs marked base. Conditional overlays sit outside the base total and unknown amounts are not treated as zero.

Excluded items include seller taxes, financing, furnishing, renovation, insurance, and recurring ownership costs. Midpoints are used for bounded fee ranges, with no intermediate rounding.

Calculations use the fixed FX snapshot dated 2026-07, not live exchange rates. Each record discloses a representative jurisdiction or grouped destination range.

No ordinary all-in total is presented when the route is unavailable. Completeness is independent from purchase-route status. Benchmark calculability is independent from both purchase-route status and cost completeness. No acquisition-cost or all-in figure is calculated when the standardized price benchmark does not represent an eligible asset for the modeled route.

Incomplete records are labelled known-base/incomplete; a country average is labelled as a known-base average when any contributor is incomplete.

Source hierarchy

Official tax and land authorities come first, followed by legislation and government guidance, major professional firms, and established research providers only when primary sources do not publish a usable range.

Acquisition data as of 2026-09-04; every destination also carries its own review date. Property-price evidence and acquisition-cost confidence are separate.

This is comparative research, not individualized tax or legal advice. Outcomes depend on nationality, residence, ownership structure, asset type, municipality, and current law; verify the transaction with local counsel.