Hello Going Expat People,
If you got here is because you are moving to NL and you are looking for some guidance.
Nowadays it can be a bit frustrating with the housing market. It is, in fact, totally crazy and there is so much to take in account.
I understand a lot of people move to Amsterdam because there are more job opportunities where Dutch is not needed. However Amsterdam is the most expensive city of the Country and the ratio between the quality of the apartment and the money you pay for it is often not good.
Here some useful links if you are moving to the Netherlands:
BSN – it is your ID, you’ll need it to work, open a bank account, get your health insurance (mandatory). The BSN goes together with registration. Of course it can happen you don’t find an address where to register immediately so you can apply for the RNI. RNI is the non-resident-database available in 19 municipalities. Thanks to that you can get you BSN and you have 4 months to look for a address where to register.
If you are getting confused because of all the acronyms, no worries, here a video where I explain it better.
Funda.nl – it is the main website used to look for apartment, both to rent or to buy.
If you are looking for a room, the most common one is Kamernet.
Be always careful and visit the apartment/room before provide any document or money
Tax discount: if you are moving with a job already, you can apply for the tax ruling, it means that a specific % of your salary won’t be taxed. There are some requirements for both the employer and employee, I have explained them better at this article. Or watch my video on youtube to learn more about it.
One of the question I always receive is “what is the minimum to earn in order to have a good level of life?” I would say 35k before taxes per year which is more or less €2400 per month. Of course won’t be luxury life, especially if you live in one of the main cities, but definitely enough to have a good life.
Health Insurance
It is private and mandatory. Nowadays we reached the average of €150 per month. You must have it and you start to pay for it the moment you are registered in the Netherlands. So if yo register today and think to activate a health insurance after 3 months, you’d pay all the 3 months since the day you got the Dutch address. There is no way to save money.
Ask to your employer if they have a discount with some health agency insurance, it often happen they got a 10% discount for the employees. Anyway HR informs about it.
Transportation
If you use the train very often then the tip is to apply (online)for the personal OV chipkaart and chose the subscription that matches better with your need. If you (almost) never use the train but only the bus. metro and tram then you can buy an anonymous OV chipkaart, it costs €7 and you can get it at any station. You can charge it and use in any transportation to pay only for the stop you take instead of €3,50 – €4 of a single ticket.
More details are available at the video I recorded on You tube.
And if you have more questions, please reach me out!
You might find interesting to read the article with some job research tips
If you are moving with kids or you are planning to have once arrive din NL, this article about the Dutch school system https://www.goingexpat.info/en/going-to-school-the-dutch-way/might be helpful
Talk to you soon
Rossella
