Posted on 2024-03-08

My partner Dustin and I, and my brother, wished to move to the Netherlands as freelancers and to take advantage of the Dutch American Friendship Treaty. This is our experieince based on our needs.

Apartment

Find an apartment while still living in the US. We had the most success with https://www.pararius.com/english. After a few weeks of negotiating, application, and approval, we managed to get anapartment in The Hague. Our requirements for an apartment were:

two bedrooms
two bathrooms
allows cats
easy walking access to trains and grocery stores

Fly to the Netherlands

Pick up keys to the apartment

Cell Phone Service

Get a Dutch phone number. This was probably necessary for registering with The hague for a non-resident BSN and for opening personal bank accounts, I did not want to use my American phone number, or have any issue with that. Since we did not yet have a Dutch bank account (specifically with an IBAN), we went to KPN to obtain pre-paid Dutch SIM cards using only our American passports and a credit card.

Non-Resident BSN

Obtain a non-resident BSN

Peronal Banking

Obtain a personal bank account from Triodos

Wire money to the Triodos account using the IBAN and SWIFT codes

After two weeks of getting apartment keys, obtaining a non-resident BSN, and obtaining personal Dutch bank accounts, we flew back to the US to finish our moving.

Cats (Pets)

Both my partner and my brother have cats.

Forming a Business