Moving to Monterrey & Citizenship Questions

[SarniaGrl]

Hi everyone, I am a Canadian whose mother was a Mexican citizen up to her marriage to my Canadian father. When she moved to Canada she renounced her Mexican citizenship upon obtaining Canadian citizenship. I know the UK has an Ancestry visa (which I am eligible for on my dad's side), is there such a thing with Mexico? She is of the opinion I wouldn't be able to obtain citizenship because of her action in renouncing hers.

Also, I've read about many colonies of ex-pats, but nothing pertaining to Monterrey. Does it have a relatively high cost of living in comparision to southwestern Ontario?

[axolotl]

Mexico doesn't have an ancestry visa type of program. You'll have to apply for an FM3 non-resident visa as everyone else does. You can, however, enter Mexico as a tourist and apply for the FM3 while you are there. This is fine if you are only planning to live there temporarily. If you want to become a citizen you need to get the FM2. I don't know if your mother's renunciation will affect any attempt to obtain Mexican citizenship on your part; I wouldn't think so but you would have to talk to a Mexican immigration lawyer about that.

Sorry, I don't know anything about Monterrey.

[Michelle M. Filion]

Living in Monterrey is a little more expensive than, let's say, Guadalajara but still, things are still cheap compared to the cost of living in Canada.

Before moving to Mexico, I looked at pictures of the main cities and at first glance, Monterrey didn't seem the nicest one -that big dark mountain looked frightening! But after seeing the actual city (we stayed there for a week), I changed my mind

The downsides of Monterrey:
-since it's so close to the US border, the city is "americanized" (lot's of Walmart, McDonald, Costco....) and has lost a little of its mexican charm.
-the weather: extremely hot during the summer, extremely cold during the winter.

Hope this helps