iThink - 1:36 pm on Aug 26, 2010 (gmt 0)

Singapore is a good country to move to but I can't imagine what advantage anyone moving from India will gain while being in online business.

Canada takes self employed people only if they're accomplished or recognized at the national level in art and culture. Beats me why! If you're an entrepreneur you need to have $1 million before they'll even look at you.

Canada had an International Immigrant Investor Program, where someone having a networth of CDN$800,000 can get permanent resident status. Out of this CDN$400,000 is to be put in an interest free deposit with the Canadian government for 5 years. That used to be the easiest way to move to Canada and the one I seriously considered for myself as well in the past. I'm also from India. Now they are planning to raise this networth requirement to CDN$1.6 million and minimum investment requirement to CDN$800,000. So the bar has gone up a lot for those who are interested.

Some banks like CIBC and Desjardins in Canada provide loan for the amount that is to be deposited with the Canadian government. You (investors) have to pay interest on that amount for 5 years in advance to the bank. Desjardins is charging CDN$120,000 as interest [immigrantinvestor.com] on CDN$400,000 for 5 years. With the minimum deposit taken by government doubling, I guess the interest will also double to CDN$240,000.

This is the cleanest and easiest way for someone having deep pockets planning to move to Canada in search of better business opportunities. As far as I know, there is no restriction on where an investor has to live in Canada. One may live in the bigger cities like Vancouver like I was looking to do.

If you're making lots of money and can get the immigration papers, the SF Bay Area in the US is by far, hands down, the best place to immigrate :)

Can't agree more with that.