If you’ve ever slid into my DMs asking “Jessica, what can I do for income if I move to Mexico?,” then this post is for you.
It’s one of the most common questions I get from mamas in my community. You’re dreaming of a different kind of life. Maybe you’re thinking about raising your kids in México, or you’ve already made the move and you’re trying to figure out how to rebuild income from the ground up. You want something flexible enough to work around school pickup at 1pm, a different time zone, and the reality of doing life in a new country.
I had this exact conversation on the Viva la Mami podcast with Abbey Ashley, founder of The Virtual Savvy – a multi-million-dollar education company that has trained thousands of women to start virtual assistant businesses from home. Abbey leads a community of more than 140,000 VAs worldwide, and her whole philosophy is built around something I deeply believe in: you already have what it takes.
Here’s what we covered.
What is a virtual assistant?
A virtual assistant, or VA, is essentially a remote support professional who helps small business owners with the tasks that keep them stuck in the weeds. Think calendar management, answering customer service emails, scheduling social media, data entry, uploading YouTube videos, managing inbox – all the things a business owner needs done but doesn’t have time to do themselves.
The key word is remote. Everything is done from a laptop, which means from home, from a café in León, from wherever you are in the world.
Abbey breaks services into three general buckets: admin (inbox, scheduling, data entry), creative (Canva graphics, blog writing, social media content), and technical (website backend, software integrations). Most people start on the admin side with skills they already have, and that’s the point.
You have more skills than you think.
This is where Abbey and I really connected. So many mamis, especially those who stepped away from careers to raise their kids, assume they’ve fallen behind. That they don’t have anything valuable enough to charge for. Abbey pushes back on that hard.
If you’ve been managing your family’s calendar, emailing back and forth with teachers, coordinating schedules, or running a household. Those are transferable, billable skills. We discount ourselves constantly, and a big part of starting a VA business is simply deciding to stop doing that.
What skills are actually in demand right now?
Here’s where it gets really interesting. We recorded this episode in June 2026, and Abbey was candid: AI is changing everything but not in the way most people fear.
Right now, you can still land clients without being an AI expert. But that window is closing. Abbey’s take is that virtual assistants who don’t learn to integrate AI tools into their work will eventually find themselves out of the market. The VAs who learn to use AI to automate, to build workflows, to be that “human in the loop” will command $50–$60+ per hour and become genuinely irreplaceable.
Her advice: start now, with the skills you have, get your first clients, and use that stability to slowly build your AI knowledge on the side. Don’t wait until you’re an expert. Start moving.
How do you actually get your first client?
Step one, according to Abbey: do a skills analysis. You can literally open ChatGPT, paste in your experience and software knowledge, and ask it to generate 20–30 services you could offer. Then build simple packages – 20, 40, or 80 hours per month so clients know exactly what they’re buying.
Step two: tell people. Not perfectly. Not with a polished website or a full portfolio. Just tell your friends, your family, your former colleagues. Post on whichever social platform your real-life network is actually on. Send a personal text to that business owner you know. Offer to grab coffee, not to pitch them, but to talk through your idea and get their thoughts. Abbey says most students land their very first client through someone they already know, exactly the way I landed my first VA role through a close friend who knew I was moving to México and needed support.
She also mentioned platforms like LinkedIn and Alignable for networking beyond your personal circle, and her free Facebook community where job leads are posted regularly.
What does income actually look like?
The VA model runs on monthly recurring revenue, and that’s what makes it so powerful for moms who need stability. Rather than chasing one-time gigs, you sign clients to monthly packages. Abbey’s example: four clients each paying $600/month for 20 hours of work = $2,400/month working about 20 hours a week. That’s her “core four” and for a lot of mamas, that’s the goal.
The 90-Day Accelerator program Abbey runs is designed to get you from zero to first paying client in 90 days. She’s realistic that life happens and timelines vary, but the structure is there to move you forward.
A couple of her financial tips worth holding onto: save 30% of your profit for taxes from day one (you’re self-employed now, and that matters), and pretend your first few invoices don’t exist, put them straight into a business savings account to build a buffer. Building toward one to three months of runway will make the whole thing feel a lot more sustainable.
Is this actually location-independent?
Yes. Abbey’s answer was an emphatic 110%. As an independent contractor, clients cannot legally tell you when to work. You can be operating from a different time zone, a different country, a different continent, and it doesn’t matter. She shared the story of one of her top students, a Brazilian-American mom who built a $2-million VA agency and eventually moved her entire family back to Brazil, where she now runs the business full-time.
That’s the vision, right there.
How do you build this as a mom without burning out?
Abbey recommends starting with an “ideal week” – mapping out your actual life on paper, everything in it, and honestly looking at where five or more dedicated, distraction-free hours exist. Not hours where a toddler is pulling on your sleeve. Real focused work time. That might mean nap time, early mornings, or asking for help – from a partner, a mother-in-law, a friend who wants to do a childcare swap.
She also offered the mindset shift that stuck with me most: approach your business like a scientist, not a judge. Don’t label things as failures. Run experiments. Analyze what worked. Double down on whatever got you results. That framing takes so much of the pressure off, especially for those of us who are chronic perfectionists.
Where to start
Abbey’s free training, Become a Booked Out Virtual Assistant, is the first step she recommends for everyone. It covers choosing your services, building packages, and her top three places to find clients.
And if you’re ready to invest in your future business, join the The Virtual Savvy 90-Day Accelerator! This is the fastest, most supported way to launch your VA business & land your first paying client in 90 days.
The bottom line: if you’re a mama dreaming of a life that doesn’t fit inside a 9-to-5, the VA model is one of the most realistic, flexible, and accessible paths to real income – from anywhere. You don’t need a new degree. You don’t need to be a tech expert. You need five focused hours a week and enough courage for just the next step.
Show Notes
In this episode, I sit down with Abbey Ashley, founder of The Virtual Savvy and one of the leading voices in virtual assistant education, to answer a question I get from mamis in my community all the time: what can I do for income if I move abroad?
Abbey breaks it all down – what a VA business actually is, what skills you need to start, how to land your first client, and whether this model can truly support a life outside the US. If you’ve been dreaming of raising your family in another country without giving up your income, this one is for you.
What you’ll hear:
- What a virtual assistant actually does, and why this business model is made for moms who need flexibility
- Which skills are in demand right now (including what’s changing with AI and why now is actually the best time to start)
- How to land your first paying client with no portfolio, no experience, and no big following
- What a realistic income timeline looks like, and how to build financial stability from the start
- Why this business model is 110% location-independent and what that looks like in real life
Resources Mentioned:
- FREE training – Become a Booked Out Virtual Assistant
- The Virtual Savvy 90-Day Accelerator
- The Virtual Savvy free Facebook community: thevirtualsavvy.com/community
About Our Guest
Abbey Ashley | The Virtual Savvy
Abbey Ashley is the founder of The Virtual Savvy, a multi-million-dollar online education company that has helped thousands of women build flexible, work-from-home careers as virtual assistants. She leads a community of more than 140,000 VAs worldwide and has been recognized by Forbes Next 1000 and Inc. Magazine’s Top 100 Female Entrepreneurs.
