Rebase

Peter Levels was living in Portugal during COVID-19 when he noticed a pattern: digital nomads and remote workers were flocking to the country to establish residency. The problem was complex—these highly mobile professionals faced a legal and tax nightmare. Where do you pay taxes when you're never in one place? How do you establish residency in a new country without a support system? Peter saw dozens of people arriving in Lisbon asking the same questions, and he realized this was a systemic problem with a gap in the market.

Peter launched Rebase with a clever business model: he didn't become a lawyer. Instead, he built a referral platform connecting users to vetted immigration lawyers who specialized in serving remote workers and digital nomads. His approach was inspired by Stripe Atlas, which simplifies company formation. The initial MVP was a Typeform landing page with a black background and white text asking simply: "Do you want to move to Portugal?" It wasn't fancy, but it was functional. He integrated Stripe for payments and Stripe Identity for KYC (know-your-customer) verification—meaning users uploaded their passports to Stripe, not to Peter, keeping data safe while ensuring legal compliance.

The design evolved significantly. When the Typeform version didn't gain traction, Peter realized that moving to a new country is an intense decision requiring emotional reassurance. He redesigned the landing page with beautiful photography of Lisbon (complete with the San Francisco-like Golden Gate Bridge lookalike, the Vasco da Gama Bridge), added video, music, and emojis—his signature design aesthetic—to make the experience feel trustworthy and inspiring.

Peter's launch strategy was characteristically organic: he tweeted a casual photo of himself sitting on his bed with the Rebase landing page open and wrote "POV building an immigration as a service startup." The tweet exploded. It received thousands of retweets, people started asking for the URL, and sign-ups poured in. This was Peter's first viral product moment in eight years (since Nomad List). He suddenly had 400+ sign-ups a month—more than the lawyer partners could handle.

The viral tweet worked. The market timing worked—Portugal had lost 9% of its population in 50 years and desperately needed foreign residents. Remote work was exploding post-COVID. But the lawyer bottleneck nearly broke the product. Peter had to close sign-ups temporarily while the lawyer firm he partnered with hired five additional staff members to handle the load. This became a good problem: his commission-based model ($30-50k MRR from 400-500 monthly sign-ups) meant he didn't need to hire employees himself.

What didn't work initially was the pure functionality-first approach. The black Typeform generated almost no interest. The moment Peter invested in design—beautiful imagery, emotional storytelling, and visual trust signals—the product resonated.

Rebase now helps 9% of all people who move to Portugal annually. Peter processes around 400-500 sign-ups per month, generating approximately $30-50k in MRR ($360-600k ARR) through commissions from immigration lawyers. The product has become so successful that the Portuguese government—historically difficult to reach—hasn't even contacted Peter, but his platform is materially changing the country's immigration patterns.

Peter continues his broader philosophy: ship many projects, accept that most fail, and let the few winners compound. Rebase is one of only four successful projects out of 70+ he's launched. The fact that it took eight years to achieve another viral product after Nomad List hasn't discouraged him. He's already working on expanding the model to other countries like Spain, Mexico, and Dubai based on Twitter research.