Sending Money from USA to Brazil

Isnt it just better to become a citizen?....I am trying that now but taking forever....  My wife is Brazilian and we got married in NY...live in Florida......but want to have options for the future...

01/22/24 1) For folks from USA citizens, if you are sending money to a significant other in Brazil as an American citizen in a large amount over 20,000 USD is there a suggested way to send this money - by Wize or bank transfer or Western Union or Paypal?

2) What type of problems exist sending this amount of money from USA to Brazil? What type of documents do I need to resolve such an issue?

Thank you in advance!   

    -@roy_usa_2023

It's not terribly difficult, if your significant other is a Brazilian citizen or permanent resident and has a Brazilian bank account.  You will be required to state the purpose of the transfer, and to satisfy the Central Bank that the funds are legitimately yours and are compliant with Brazil's anti-moneylaundering laws, so a normal SWIFT bank transfer is probably the least complicated, since those safeguards are largely built into the process.  Avoid Western Union because of exorbitant fees.  At the Brazil end, if the recipient provides advance notice of the transaction to their bank, it will speed matters.

Wise works well, as well.  But I would do it in chunks under 10K each on consecutive days, otherwise they'll ask for a lot of documentation. 

Alternately, I have an American friend who's been living in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil for some 20 odd years.  I moved a lot of money through him last year when we purchased our sitio in state of RDJ.   Let me know if you want his contact info.

@abthree -thank you- if you send an amount like 50,000 or 100,000 USD using Swift Transfer to your Brazilian significant other and you tell the bank "its for your significant other personal expenses and savings" - is this a legitimate reason to send this money amount from USA to Brazil? Or is this amount too high to send overseas?

@madrac - Thank you

When I tried to send money by Wize to my fiance (we are only engaged)- Wize denied it given she was not my family, we were not married - they wanted documentation to prove we were married

is it normal? any way to bypass this with Wize?

    @abthree -thank you- if you send an amount like 50,000 or 100,000 USD using Swift Transfer to your Brazilian significant other and you tell the bank "its for your significant other personal expenses and savings" - is this a legitimate reason to send this money amount from USA to Brazil? Or is this amount too high to send overseas?
   

    -@roy_usa_2023

Short answer? No way in hell they would accept that amount of money for that reason!

If it is clear to me that you are planning an investment, home purchase, laundering money, or have some other nefarious purpose, think how obvious it would be to someone whose job it is to look out for this sort of thing...

Be realistic - half a million reais for personal living expenses, when the minimum wage is about R$18,000 a year, and whole families live off that?

01/24/24  Short answer? No way in hell they would accept that amount of money for that reason!
If it is clear to me that you are planning an investment, home purchase, laundering money, or have some other nefarious purpose, think how obvious it would be to someone whose job it is to look out for this sort of thing...

Be realistic - half a million reais for personal living expenses, when the minimum wage is about R$18,000 a year, and whole families live off that?
   

    -@Peter Itamaraca

I totally agree.  If someone abroad and their SO are planning a legitimate investment together and can document the fact at both ends, no problem, although if they're not married or business partners in some formal way, additional documentation may be required and there may be tax implications for the Brazilian partner.  But just moving a big wad of cash and calling it "living expenses" won't fly. 

Neither will splitting it up:  cumulative transfers over USD$3,000 in a single month to the same person start alarms going off at the Central Bank.  The first questions go to the bank, and if the bank knows what's going on, the situation is resolved and the customer is never the wiser.  But if the bank can't explain it, the funds will be held until there's a satisfactory explanation.

Thank you @abthree - what is the Central bank? is the intermediary bank between US bank and receiptent bank or some government bank?

There are a few reasons you can send money to Brazil:

https://wise.com/help/articles/2655506/sending-large-transfers-to-brazil

According to that link they are:

• Maintenance of residents: You are sending BRL to support your family members who are Brazilian residents; you’ll be asked to provide a proof of kinship.
• Availability of your own funds: You are sending money to yourself, to be used by you in Brazil.
• Purchasing real estate or land directly from a seller: You’ll be asked to provide a complete sales agreement with all signatures. But, if the seller is a Real Estate company or agent — we can’t process your transfer.

Since your finance is not your spouse, you wouldn't qualify under the first bulleted item.  Is she a joint holder of your bank account?  If so, even if you initiate the transfer, she is owner of the funds, and technically the transfer is her sending money from her account to her account, which qualifies under the 2nd bulleted item. If that is not the case, a solution may be to wire the money to her account in the US and have her transfer it. There may be tax ramifications for doing so in Brazil, which I may not be aware of (since it would be a 'gift'). The easiest solution would be if you both held a joint account in the US.

I have sent large sums on a few occasions without issue because my wife is joint on our US account and I sent to her BR account.   My name is now on our account in BR so I just transfer money from me to me, with no issue.

I have always used Wise for transfers.  It has been the best in my experience for transferring large or small sums

@BRBC- thank you! this is a great post!

    Thank you @abthree - what is the Central bank? is the intermediary bank between US bank and receiptent bank or some government bank?
   

    -@roy_usa_2023

He is referring to the Central Bank of Brazil - not to be confused with the Bank of Brazil. The Central Bank of Brazil is like the Federal Reserve in the US...