If you’re looking for inexpensive cosmopolitan living—but with many of the conveniences you’d expect in New York, Miami, or any other major First-World city—you owe it to yourself to take a serious look at Panama City.

The capital city of Panama boasts a skyline of skyscrapers, modern office buildings, condo complexes, and hotels of shining glass and steel, with world-class views of the Bay of Panama. It’s a major international commerce and banking hub, home to more than 80 of the world’s largest banks, along with major international organizations and multinationals such as Caterpillar, Dell, and 3M.

With good reason, the city is known as the Hub of the Americas; the Tocumen International Airport (“PTY” in airport speak) offers daily flights from Panama City to destinations all over the world. Whether you want to travel within the Americas or to Europe and beyond, Panama’s convenience is priceless.

As Central America’s true First-World capital, Panama City offers a high-value combination of benefits you won’t find anywhere else in the region. And whether you’re seeking a luxury lifestyle or plan to live like a local, you’re likely to live more comfortably and save more easily than you did back home.

Here you can dine in gourmet restaurants that wouldn’t be out of place in cities like New York or Barcelona (and, in fact, many of the chefs working in Panama today have trained in world-famous culinary capitals). You can attend movies and plays in Spanish or in English, patronize the arts, and attend world-class symphonies, opera, and the ballet.

You can also spend 50% less on clothes at the famous bargain department stores that draw visitors from all over the region… or check out the many unique boutiques, handicraft stalls, and “mecca malls” for a most pleasant day of shopping.

Go to a fancy spa like Mosaic in Punta Pacífica’s Multiplaza Mall and spend $100 on a luxurious massage, or spend as little as $12 on tickets to VIP theaters with reclining chairs, cocktails, and waiter service (regular theaters at the same cinema show first-run movies for just $6). 

It doesn’t take long to realize that in Panama City you can truly enjoy First-World luxuries and amenities for half the price of what you’d pay in any U.S. or Canadian city.

And in Panama City, so many of the best things to see and do are free. There are countless free events every month. Concerts at the massive Omar Park or Jazzfest at the City of Knowledge are always fun.

A favorite local pastime is walking along the Amador Causeway, or Calzada de Amador. Surrounded by blue Pacific waters, this breakwater and tourist area is always breezy. 

The newer Cinta Costera, along the Panama Bay, is probably the most popular promenade in the city. A network of walkways, bike paths, and recreation areas, it leads from Bella Vista to Casco Viejo, the city’s romantic colonial quarter.

It’s this mix of old and new, modern and traditional, that makes Panama City so special. Renovated villas from the turn of the century are flanked by technologically advanced “smart” buildings.

In colonial Casco Viejo you’ll find restored mansiones gracing the plazas… along with wooden caserios—the tumbledown housing of old-timers who have lived here since before gentrification began. In swank cafés, well-heeled locals and tourists sip café-con-leche and the best Argentinian malbec while local kids run through the streets and kick around soccer balls.

Panama City is the number one choice in Latin America if you’re looking for inexpensive cosmopolitan living. The world-class restaurants, 5-star hotels, and hundreds of international businesses make for an unbeatable combination… all for much less than you’d pay in any other U.S., Canadian, or European city.