A new residency system, a desire for new lifestyles and opportunities, and a dislike of domestic US political and social trends is encouraging HNW Americans to look at the UK.

In all the complaints about how some HNW individuals are quitting the UK rather than entering it in search of new, less heavily taxed pastures, there's a bit of an exception: Americans. 

This sort of trend might seem odd for those used to seeing the US, not the UK, as the land of opportunity. While the UK still has its charms, stories about fraying public infrastructure, crime and quality of life are rife. The current Labour government has hiked taxes to late 1940s levels and removed the old resident non-domicile system. Added to that, the net of inheritance tax has widened.

But it appears that the recent replacement of the resident “non-dom” regime – a desire to avoid social and political volatility in the US, and a more positive wish to seek variety and adventure abroad – is fuelling a desire among some US citizens to leave, and they're interested in the UK. Lawyers tell WealthBriefing that their caseloads of US citizens seeking options in the UK have risen considerably. 

“A few years ago, I would have had one or two Americans on my books at any one time…now, 40 per cent of clients on my books are American. That is pretty significant,” Zoe Jacob, the head of Boodle Hatfield’s immigration team, told this publication in an interview. “It is coming up in conversations. Some clients are thinking of only spending up to four years in the UK; others are looking at being here for longer. 

“We have tried to make our clients aware of what the options are in the UK and other [firms] in our sphere have done the same,” Jacob said. 

In 2025 alone, 8,790 US citizens applied for British citizenship, with record-breaking application volumes in the final quarter.

One factor is the residency system that finance minister Rachel Reeves brought in as part of her November 2024 Budget. During the first four years of UK residence, a new foreign income and gains (FIG) regime can give qualifying individuals a four-year reprieve from taxes if they have lived outside the UK for at least 10 years. Four years is not a long period, but for people such as tech entrepreneurs, there’s still value to it.

A question that always arises is how much choice US expats have, because they are taxed on a worldwide basis, contrasting with the territorial approach that most citizens enjoy. If Americans want to renounce their citizenship, it carries a cost.

Linkages
At Multrees Investor Services, which provides custody, execution, and investment administration, it sees a more nuanced picture than a simple choice of US citizens coming to the UK or elsewhere.

“We are also seeing a noticeable increase in interest from existing prospective advisors and family offices with US-connected client bases, particularly those seeking scalable operational support to handle US tax reporting alongside UK and international requirements,” Martyn Johnson, Multrees’ chief operating officer, told WealthBriefing.

“What we are seeing is advisors dealing with more US-linked cross-border scenarios, where the client, assets, tax position and reporting requirements do not sit neatly in one jurisdiction,” Johnson said. 

“The increase is not just about volume, but complexity. Advisors can support this demand, but the firms coping best are not trying to do everything themselves. They are building specialist ecosystems around the client, typically involving UK and US tax advisors, immigration specialists, lawyers, investment managers, and wealth structuring experts,” he said. 

Itchy feet
There is quite a narrative now about Americans seeking pastures new. 

On 25 May, the Wall Street Journal said that in 2025, for the first time since the Great Depression, more people moved out of the country than entered it. “America’s own citizens are leaving in record numbers, replanting themselves and their families in lands they find more affordable and safe,” it said. “A millions-strong diaspora is studying, telecommuting and retiring overseas. The new American dream, for some of its citizens, is to no longer live there.”

The WSJ, citing data from the Brookings Institute, a think tank, said the US experienced net negative migration – an estimated loss of some 150,000 people – in 2025, and the outflow is likely to increase in 2026.

Even without the colourful language of such news commentaries, the shift is catching attention – with a possible commercial benefit. As reported a few days ago, Boodle Hatfield tapped into this trend. It teamed up with Luxury Collective Global Advisory Group to release a new white paper examining the evolving landscape of UK immigration for HNW US citizens seeking “to live, invest, or establish long-term roots in the United Kingdom”.

An inflow of HNW and other US citizens will not necessarily compensate fully for an outflow of wealthy individuals from the UK. Nevertheless, it counters some of the worries that the UK is a more difficult place for well-heeled people to inhabit. There has been extensive focus on how mobile HNW people have considered leaving – a topic covered here and here in our series on “family offices in motion.” The share of the population who are millionaires will fall by 20 per cent by 2028, according to the Adam Smith Institute.

Wealth sector implications
An influx of US citizens, however large or rapid, raises opportunities for UK-based advisors. A crop of firms now makes a point of offering US nationals access to financial services outside the US: MASECO – in the process of being bought by US-based Creative Planning; W1M; Schroders (being acquired by US-based Nuveen); and Shard Capital.

In 2010, new US tax compliance laws prompted some banks such as HSBC and Deutsche Bank to shut their doors to US clients, seen as a compliance burden. Membership groups such as American Citizens Abroad have also pressed US lawmakers in Washington DC to move towards residency-based tax and away from the worldwide tax regime. 

As Boodle Hatfield’s Jacob summed up: “the London market has become very sophisticated in serving Americans. There are many more Americans in London now.”