It's going to happen! Moving abroad!

[dutchgirl678]

I just accepted a job in the Netherlands! Ack! I'm super excited as it is the perfect job for me and I am excited to have my kids and husband learn Dutch and experience living in Europe for a while. I am anxious because it means finding a rental house over there and a school for my kid(s) and my husband would like to find a job there eventually as well. I also have to investigate moving companies to see about moving furniture etc over. 

[irish]

Congrats! Exciting and nerve wracking at the same time. Good luck with the move. Are they helping you move or is it all on your own?

[dutchgirl678]

Thanks irish! They are reimbursing us for the move and our plane tickets!

[Deleted]

Congrats!! When is the big move?

[mrsukyankee]

Congratulations! There are a few ex- and current Netherlands folks, so hopefully any questions you have will get answered. Best of luck!

[dutchgirl678]

Thanks all! We are hoping to move in August before school starts.

First question for people who moved there, did you find a place to live before you moved or is that virtually impossible? I'm hoping to get some help from my new employer or my parents in that area but it's hard to decide on a rental house without seeing it.

[mrsukyankee]

I waited until I moved over. I don't trust estate agents (for good reason). I rented a b&b room for two weeks and found a place by then. A lot of times employers will fly you over beforehand (I wasn't in that sort of high level job so I had to pay for my look-see visit). But I wouldn't rent sight-unseen unless you can get a short-term rental.

[dutchgirl678]

That doesn't sound ideal in our situation since we have two small kids. We are planning to rent an empty house and move furniture over. The company is paying for it. But if we have no place of residence, where do we send the container to? Or leave it in port until we have a place? I will make some inquiries this week with some international movers.

I wish I had time to visit myself before August but DD and I have to get our Dutch passports renewed and I'm not sure how long that takes.

[jenadele]

Congratulations on the new job and the super exciting move!  I live in Brussels, Belgium so we'll kind of be neighbors  I don't know all the ins-and-outs of the Netherlands but if you have any general questions feel free to ask me and I'll hopefully be able to give you some insight (on moving as well as traveling around the region!).  As to the concern about finding a place to live - I would definitely wait until you get there to find some place.  I'm not sure what your company is offering financially but a lot of companies will pay for a week up to a month in temporary housing once you arrive in the new country.  If this isn't an option for you though, I would ask your HR department if they can hook you up with a relocation company before your move so that the day you show up, you could potentially meet with the relocation agent and have properties lined up to view.  Again, some companies will pay for this service for you, but even if your company doesn't, they should at least provide the name and contact information and you can contact the service yourself.  You'll find that everyone will be able to speak with you in English so no worries there on conveying what you're looking for.  Hope this helps a bit and like I said, let me know if you have any other questions!  Veel Succes!!

[origami]

Apr 13, 2014 13:18:29 GMT -5 dutchgirl678 said:

That doesn't sound ideal in our situation since we have two small kids. We are planning to rent an empty house and move furniture over. The company is paying for it. But if we have no place of residence, where do we send the container to? Or leave it in port until we have a place? I will make some inquiries this week with some international movers.

I wish I had time to visit myself before August but DD and I have to get our Dutch passports renewed and I'm not sure how long that takes.

I have no idea how long sea shipments to Europe take but mine to asia will take 3 months. You may have plenty of time to find a place before your furniture gets there, if you send it by sea.
ETA I have two 3 yr olds and I think it would be easier to stay in a hotel for a week or 2. At least you know there you'll have sheets, towels, won't need to grocery shop right away, etc. We went early to pick out a rental property (we don't move til July) and we will still stay in a hotel for a few days when we actually move because the destination's concept of "furnished" leaves much to be desired.

[dutchgirl678]

Thanks for the good advice. I also should mention that I grew up in the Netherlands and am a native speaker so there are no issues there. But being able to stay in a hotel and seeing properties after arrival sounds like a good idea. I wasn't sure if the moving company would need the address before moving.

[Deleted]

We stayed in a hotel for a month. It was kind of a lousy experience for us because we had an infant and two dogs. The dogs were allowed in the hotel only when we were there so when we left, they had to come with us. What about renting a VRBO type apartment for a few weeks?
We used a makelaar and I am pretty sure that is standard in Amsterdam - not sure about where you are going though.

www.funda.nl is a legit apartment rental site.

I think I've mentioned this to you before but went you rent an apartment, furnished means walk in ready. SEMI Furnished means no furniture but will come with appliances, floors and wall coverings, and window treatments. UNFURNISHED (which is very common) means you bring your own wall covers (and I don't mean pictures I mean dry wall) flooring (and I don't just mean area rugs I mean something to go between concrete and your feet), doorknobs, even the racks in the closet and light fixtures are bare.

I would have rented an apartment site unseen as long as it came with the major things I wanted and was in the location we wanted. Once we found the apartment we wanted, we were able to move in three days later. It was semi furnished though so we ended up using marktplaats for most of our furniture and household items.

Good luck and congrats!

[Shreddingbetty]

Apr 13, 2014 13:18:29 GMT -5 dutchgirl678 said:

I wish I had time to visit myself before August but DD and I have to get our Dutch passports renewed and I'm not sure how long that takes.

Getting your passport renewed is super fast once the consulate has your app. I ad mine in the mail within 2 weeks both times I had renewed mine. It was faster than my us passport. Don't know where you are at but I had to go to San Francisco and getting appointments was easy once I knew when we were going. When I got DDs passport I was able to do it in Denver 2 years ago and apparently they still come to Denver once a year. I did not know that because the darn honorary consul never bothered to get back to me.  If you go to San Francisco I would recommend getting your picture done down the street from them (it is on their website who they recommend) as the Dutch ate ridiculously strict about their passport pic.  This place does them all the time and it took like 5 minutes

[pittpurple]

Are you super attached to your furniture? Just since it could theoretically take months to get it and I was just wondering if your company would instead pay to just furnish a place there and you could just buy stuff when you get over here?

And congrats!! Super exciting :-)

We moved over and stayed in a hotel for a couple weeks while we flat hunted. It was a bit of a nightmare here (the UK) as we couldn't get a bank account without an address and we couldn't get an address without a bank account. We moved here on our own though so didn't have any relocation assistance, I'm sure there were options we didn't know about. I wouldn't rent without seeing it but I've gone an looked at flats here for visiting researchers so maybe someone at your new company can help and go see something if you find something that sounds good?

[azure]

Congrats on the move!

On our last move we had our container stored in Vietnam before moving it to France (we house hunted once we got here). It took about 6 weeks to be shipped once we gave the go ahead to the moving company.

On our next move, we will most likely ship it and have it stored at a facility in our new city until we find a house.

[UnderProtest]

Congrats! On the furniture shipment, ours was quoted at 5-8 weeks from the east coast to London. It took just over 4 weeks. Some of the delay is getting through customs which is obviously dependent on the country. Good luck in getting everything figured out.

[dutchgirl678]

Thanks for all the advice! totziens, we have been stalking funds.nl already and also pararius. I already knew about the different types of housing, whether it is furnished or has flooring or not. I have even seen one that was so bare it didn't have a kitchen! lol.

I will start asking around today about furniture shipments, we are on the west coast. We are not super attached and a lot of our stuff is from IKEA so we could easily sell it here and buy new there, there is an IKEA nearby. I will ask the company about that too.

As for the passports, they do come here once a year, but I heard they have no money this year to come up. We may go to SF or to LA and combine that with a trip to Disney for the kids. Glad to hear it's fast!

[oneslybookworm]

Congrats on the move!! Our company sent us on a house hunting trip about a month before we moved over...we picked an apartment then.

We rented a fully furnished apartment, then brought over the big stuff we couldn't live without (bed, desk, some decorations, etc.). Otherwise, we would have had to rent furniture while our shipment went through customs. We had two shipments...an air shipment and a boat shipment. Our air shipment took a few weeks, the boat about 6 weeks. You can either send it ahead of you and the you'll have it when you get there (if you're lucky and customs isn't being a PITA), or you can have it sent when you move and wait on it on the other side. Either way, if you take big stuff with you, you're going to be without it for about 4-6 weeks while it ships over and goes through customs.

Good luck! Let me know if you have any questions!