Mauritania

Mauritania is not a retirement destination, and it is not a remote work hub. The Level 3 "Reconsider Travel" advisory from the State Department is the first thing you need to sit with. That rating reflects real terrorism risk, particularly in areas outside the capital Nouakchott, where Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb has operated. The narrow category of person who ends up living here long-term is typically someone working for an NGO, an extractive industry employer, or a diplomatic mission. If you are a self-directed retiree or a freelancer with location flexibility, there are 40 better options at similar price points with a fraction of the security exposure.

The numbers look cheap on paper. A single person can cover living expenses excluding rent for roughly $770 per month, and a one-bedroom in central Nouakchott runs around $180. That puts a functional monthly budget at approximately $950 to $1,100 once you add utilities, local transport, and incidentals. What that figure does not account for is the cost of maintaining your own security infrastructure. Expats employed here by international organizations typically receive housing allowances, hardship pay, and access to employer-arranged medical evacuation. If you are arriving independently, those costs land entirely on you. A medical evacuation policy alone can run $300 to $500 per year, and that assumes you are evacuated in time for it to matter.

The practical friction is significant. Healthcare is the most immediate concern. The Numbeo healthcare index for Mauritania sits at 31.4, which places it near the bottom globally. Nouakchott has a small number of clinics, but anything serious sends you to Morocco or France. The working language is Arabic and French, with Hassaniya Arabic dominant in daily life. English proficiency is low, and navigating bureaucracy, landlords, or medical situations without French fluency is genuinely difficult. Internet is available via fixed broadband, with median download speeds around 56 to 70 Mbps recorded in the Speedtest Global Index, which is adequate for remote work in theory, but reliability and consistency in practice are a different matter. Power outages are common, and infrastructure outside the capital degrades quickly.

US citizens are taxed on worldwide income regardless of where they live, so your income follows you to Mauritania like everywhere else. There is no US-Mauritania tax treaty, which means you cannot rely on treaty provisions to reduce double taxation. Your primary tools are the Foreign Earned Income Exclusion, which lets you exclude up to $126,500 of earned income for 2024 if you qualify via the bona fide residence or physical presence test, and the Foreign Tax Credit for taxes paid to Mauritania. Mauritania taxes resident individuals on income earned in the country at progressive rates reaching 33% at higher income levels. If your income is sourced entirely from the US, such as investment returns or Social Security, the FEIE does not apply to it, and you owe US tax in the normal way. FBAR and FATCA reporting requirements apply as always. The compliance picture here is not simpler than elsewhere; it is just less common, which means your US accountant may need to do more research than usual.