- Jameel Haiat and Hilcia Peña left the US and moved to Chiang Mai, Thailand.
- They started a boutique hotel, but shut it down months later so Haiat could prioritize his cancer recovery.
- Now they're focused on their passions — making art and writing poetry — and say every day feels like Saturday.
Eleven years ago, Jameel Haiat and Hilcia Peña set a goal of quitting their jobs and living life on their own terms.
The couple even picked a date to make it real and gave the name a plan: "2020 Vision."
Haiat, a production designer, was born and raised in Los Angeles. His partner, Peña, is an architect who grew up in California. In 2014, the couple was based abroad in Shanghai, where they both worked for Walt Disney Imagineering.
"We were always trying to figure out how we could leave this corporate world and be more creative," Peña, now 39, told Business Insider.
It was during their years in China that the idea of retiring abroad first took root.
"We had the opportunity to travel all over Southeast Asia, and Thailand we loved because it had good infrastructure, good healthcare, and was really affordable," Peña said. "We could see how our money could go a lot further."
They decided 2020 Vision would go into effect on February 20, 2020.
"We said that on that day, no matter where we are in the world, whatever we're doing, we're going to send an email out that says, 'We're sorry for your loss.' And then we quit," Haiat, now 59, told BI.
Moving abroad
By the time their February 2020 deadline rolled around, they were both based back in the US. But 2020 Vision didn't go quite as planned.
"We never sent the emails because everything came to fruition as we had hoped," Haiat said.
Peña was offered a new opportunity with Disney — this time in Hong Kong.
The opportunity to relocate to Hong Kong felt like a step toward their goal of retiring abroad. It helped that the company was paying for their move, so she accepted the job. Haiat, who was laid off when his project wrapped, joined as a trailing spouse.
In 2023, after Peña wrapped up her final project, the couple moved from Hong Kong to Chiang Mai, about 450 miles north of Bangkok.
The boutique hotel chapter
In recent years, Chiang Mai has become a popular destination for expats, like Haiat and Peña, who are looking to relocate.
Data from the Bureau of Registration Administration of Thailand indicates that there were 163,036 foreigners living in Chiang Mai province in 2024, up from 131,761 in 2017.
Several expats in Chiang Mai previously told BI that they were drawn to the area's safety, lower cost of living, and laid-back lifestyle.
For the couple, life in northern Thailand afforded them the freedom to indulge in their creative passions — reading, writing poetry, and making art.
It also opened up an unexpected opportunity to pursue a second career during retirement as hoteliers.
"One day on Facebook, I saw this hotel. I was like, 'Oh wow. Let's just go look at it.' Because, architecturally, it looked really pretty," Haiat said.
The hotel, owned by a Thai-Dutch couple, featured a main building and five stand-alone villas surrounded by lush rice fields.
They had no intention of taking over the property until they were on the drive back home.
"We started saying, 'Wow, what if?' And that was it. We got sucked into the world of it, and then we committed," Haiat said.
The couple decided to lease the hotel with the option to buy it. The monthly rent was 110,000 Thai baht.
The property needed a lot of work. By tapping into their backgrounds in design and architecture, they transformed the hotel.
The couple moved onto the property, into a three-bedroom apartment in the main building.
But eight months after the hotel started operating, the couple decided to close it down.
The week they decided to commit to leasing the hotel, Haiat found out he had throat cancer. Despite the diagnosis, they decided to go ahead with the hotel project.
"We didn't know what would happen, so we stuck with it," Haiat said.
However, caring for their guests turned into a round-the-clock affair, keeping him from focusing on his recovery.
"We finally determined that it was just too hard on my body and I'm never going to really recover until we just kind of stop doing this," Haiat said.
Haiat is in remission, but he still experiences side effects from radiation therapy, including the daily challenge of getting nutrition through a gastric tube.
"This will most likely be for life," he said.
Low cost of living, great healthcare
The couple broke their lease with the hotel owners late last year. They closed the hotel on the last day of December.
Now, they're back to their creative pursuits and designing their own house. Once that's ready, the couple plans to move out of the hotel.
The lower cost of living in Chiang Mai has been a great relief, the couple says.
Every month, they spend 7,500 Thai baht on medical insurance, 3,000 Thai baht on gas, and about 29,000 Thai baht on food — including special formula Haiat needs for his feeding tube.
They also say they're grateful for Chiang Mai's healthcare system.
"I never felt more comfortable and more welcomed by the nurses, the staff, the doctors. Everybody speaks basic English. And if we ask questions, they explain," Haiat said.
There's a dedicated counter to guide foreign patients through the medical system, helping with processes like insurance approval, Peña said.
"That would never happen in the US," Haiat said. "They see you as a dollar symbol. Here, people see you as a patient."
'Every day is our Saturday'
Despite all of the challenges they've experienced, the couple says their life in Chiang Mai is going "in the direction" they dreamed of years ago.
"I think it's turned out better than we expected, even with the cancer," Haiat said. "I'm going to be 60, and I've never been more creative in my entire life than I have been in this last year."
Now, they're no longer bogged down by the mundanities of corporate life.
"At work, you think about, 'What do I have to do tomorrow for work? Who do I have to call? What do I have to email? What's my schedule? What's my deadline?'" Haiat said. "Here, we don't have that. We wake up every day, and we don't even know what day it is. We say every day is our Saturday."
The slower pace of life has also been good for her mental health, Peña said. She no longer gets Sunday blues.
"Now I sleep, and the birds wake me up. I don't even have an alarm," she added.
Despite ongoing health challenges, Haiat feels like they are in the right place.
"It still is the best we've ever lived our lives. Despite the fact that I have the gastric tube and all these, I still wouldn't exchange any of this to be anywhere else except where we are right now, living the life we do," he said.
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