The first flat I rented abroad was in Istanbul, and I managed the entire process by pointing at things, nodding confidently, and hoping the landlord was not explaining something I would later regret agreeing to.
He was, as it turned out. The hot water only worked between certain hours, which he had explained in detail while I smiled and said "tamam" like I knew what I was doing.
That was the start of a run through six countries, six apartments, and six landlords who all had their own way of doing things. Portugal, Turkey, Mexico, Thailand, Colombia, Poland. None of them worked the same way. All of them taught me something I would not have picked up from a guide written by somebody who spoke the language.
Why speaking the language is not the barrier people think it is
Most people who delay moving abroad will tell you the language is the problem. That is rarely true. The actual problem is not knowing how rental markets work in a given country, and language is just the most obvious thing to blame.
In four of the six countries I rented in, the landlord and I shared fewer than twenty words of common vocabulary. We still got through viewings, negotiations, deposits, and move-in. What mattered more than speaking their language was understanding how rentals actually functioned there.
In Turkey, the estate agent drove everything. In Mexico, it was often Facebook groups and WhatsApp. In Thailand, a local friend's recommendation outweighed everything else. In Colombia, you could find places listed on local platforms, but the best ones spread by word of mouth through other expats. In Poland, an estate agent sorted it quickly and formally. In Portugal, it was a war of patience because every decent flat had twenty enquiries within hours.
Using local Facebook groups
I leant on this more than any other approach, particularly in Mexico and Colombia.
There are local Facebook groups in almost every city where expats and travellers share flat listings, recommend landlords, and warn about scams. The groups in Mexico City, Medellin, and Lisbon were large enough to generate multiple options within days. Smaller cities were slower but still useful.
The trick was posting clearly what I wanted. "Looking for a furnished one-bed flat, central area, three-month stay, budget of X." That worked better than scrolling through listings because it brought landlords to me, and the people responding had already filtered themselves by reading my requirements.
The risk was scams. I saw payments requested before viewings, fake photos, and people claiming to own properties they had never set foot in. The rule I followed: never pay anything before physically walking through the door.
Negotiating through a language gap
The viewing itself was always the strangest bit. You are walking around somebody's property, opening cupboards, checking the shower pressure, trying to work out if the Wi-Fi router is from this decade, and neither of you can say much beyond "good" and "how much."
Google Translate on a phone handled more than I expected. I would type questions and show the screen. They would type back. It was slow, but it covered the essentials: rent, deposit, bills, duration, notice period.
The thing I wish I had known earlier: write everything down in the moment. Verbal agreements in a shared language are already unreliable. Verbal agreements through a translation app are almost meaningless a month later.
My best landlord experiences came from having a simple one-page summary translated into the local language before I arrived. It listed what I wanted, how long I was staying, what I was willing to pay, and what I expected included. That removed the guesswork and made me look organised even when I was winging it.
The deposit trap
In every single country, the deposit conversation was the most tense part.
The standard expectation ranged from one month to two months' rent. In Turkey and Colombia, landlords sometimes wanted more. In Mexico, I encountered places where the deposit was negotiable if you paid several months upfront.
The pattern I noticed: landlords who resisted writing a receipt for the deposit were the same landlords who made the return of it an ordeal. I started refusing to hand cash over without a written confirmation, even if it was just a WhatsApp message stating the amount and date. That small bit of evidence saved me at least twice.
What scams looked like in each country
The scam patterns varied by market. In Lisbon, it was fake listings using real photos from sold properties. In Mexico City, it was people posing as landlords for flats they did not own, collecting deposits through bank transfer before vanishing. In Istanbul, it was bait-and-switch: the flat in the photos was not the flat you arrived to see.
The guardrails were the same everywhere:
- Never send money before seeing the flat in person.
- If the landlord cannot meet at the property, something is wrong.
- If the price looks significantly below market for the area, it probably is not real.
- Ask other tenants in the building if you can. They will often tell you things the landlord will not.
Which markets were easiest
Portugal was the hardest market. Not because of the language, but because demand outstripped supply so badly that any decent flat was gone within hours. I spent three weeks looking in Lisbon before finding something, and I only got it because someone else's deal fell through.
Thailand was the easiest. Walk around the neighbourhood you like, look for "for rent" signs on buildings, walk in, ask at the front desk or the security guard. Half the time you could see the room that day and move in the next. The formality was almost zero, which was refreshing after the bureaucratic crawl in Europe.
Poland surprised me by being efficient and straightforward. An estate agent found three options within two days, the contract was clear, and the whole thing felt closer to renting at home than anything else on the list.
Practical advice at the start
Rent short first. Always. Even if it costs more per night. A week in a serviced flat or a short-term rental while you search in person is cheaper than committing to a place that turns out to have no hot water between six and nine in the morning.
Learn ten phrases, not a whole language. "How much," "is this included," "when can I move in," "can I see a contract." Those got me further than most phrasebook conversations.
And take photos of everything on move-in day. The walls, the appliances, the flooring, the bathroom. Send them to the landlord. That tiny habit saved my deposit in at least three countries.
Nobody tells you this, but the actual skill of living abroad is not speaking the language. It is learning how things work locally, quickly, without assuming your own country's rules apply. Renting is where that lesson hits first and hardest.