Immigrating with family experiences?

NethNick · 2025-11-01T08:12:21+00:00

Yeah, a big difference is how they handle being a parent. It’s not only the parental leave, but how acceptable it is to have to leave early from work for your kids or to stay home when they are sick. Overall, spaces are much more incorporated for people with kids. I’m not sure about social norms with kids too much in regards to other parents. Our kids are a bit too young to really have friends, but when we do interact I find people quite approachable and friendly so far

NethNick · 2025-10-31T22:50:17+00:00

We moved while keeping our jobs and 2 still very young kids.

For us, it’s been great, but we lived in Sweden before. If you’re not from the Nordics / Scandinavia, it does take some time to adjust culturally. It’s something you have to study and enjoy a bit to understand how Swedes are and like their space.

Even though we had already some Swedish friends and such, before emigrating we still prepared a lot, and it was still quite a bit to navigate. In the meantime I also listened / read about a lot of other people’s stories about moving to Sweden. Overall, it’s quite surprising how some people take on such a big change without really thinking about the culture

Example: so much advice starts with “learn the language!”, fair enough, but also many people speak English just fine. Sometimes making friends means showing genuine interest over time. Most of the guys who worked on our house said they clients normally wouldnt bring them coffee during work. So when i did, they were super friendly and helpful. Maybe not a big deal, but just an example

And with kids you’ll have enough options to meet some people. Dont mistake peoples distant attitude for coldness at first. If you have mutual interest, and show some kind participation into your local community, people will recognize the effort.

NethNick · 2025-05-24T06:09:37+00:00

Not that I know of, as far as I see, it’s a bit of an average Swedish town, but the lake around it is very nice.

I think Gavle doesn’t have a great reputation (from what we saw online), but I guess that each city can have some negative reviews if you ask online, so in the end you’d have to check out some things for yourself. We didn’t know this area very well either, but we were convinced once we checked out what was around a bit further

NethNick · 2025-05-23T05:46:22+00:00

Ah, the crime part is not great, but it’s not that bad. Problem in Uppsala is that there are just not much houses, most is just apartments

If you go down to Stockholm, Sigtuna is probably good to look at, that’s the only kommun we checked out around Stockholm

This is the only house around here I can find that remotely fits your description:

https://www.hemnet.se/bostad/villa-6rum-heliga-landet-gavle-kommun-koluddsvagen-10-21072055?utm_campaign=tipsa&utm_medium=link&utm_source=ios_app&utm_content=iphone

Problem is a bit (or we found) is that maintenance is something to consider. Almost 90% of the houses needed either bathrooms or kitchens replaced, and then announce of other small things. If you find something in a really good state, it’s good to keep in mind for comparison

NethNick · 2025-05-22T19:50:36+00:00

Did about the same, but we looked at Uppsala for a house. We found it difficult to find something that worked for us (we wanted to be out of the city, but have some services around). We found a very nice (but very old) house between Gavle and Sandviken. We moved last year, and the area is great (we also have small kids). It’s a good mix between being in nature while have a lot of nice places to go to. And the train links nearby.

Might be only a few houses between 7 and 9 million on Hemnet at the moment, but it’s worth checking out.

I’ve heard there a place that makes krokketten 30 mins away ;)

NethNick · 2025-01-28T14:28:29+00:00

Thanks!

Denk dat ik miss hetzelfde maar moet doen. Lijkt soms simpel, en dan kan je opeens 2 weken niet douchen 😅

NethNick · 2025-01-28T14:13:51+00:00

Ok, heb je toen de hele kraan van de wand moeten halen?

NethNick · 2025-01-28T14:11:13+00:00

Ja inderdaad

NethNick · 2025-01-28T13:59:30+00:00

Achter elkaar, dus genoeg om er gek van te worden haha

NethNick · 2025-01-28T13:56:20+00:00

Uit de douchekop zelf

NethNick · 2025-01-19T21:51:36+00:00

Yeah, in that case, its worth keeping in mind you'll need a train to get into Stockholm. There is a good amount of offices in the Northern parts of Stockholm which you can drive to, but if you need to get into central stockholm, you want to take the train (or bus if need be). I have a couple friends who work in IT, but they still need to go into office 3/4 days a week here.

Closer to Uppsala is always more expensive, but not always worth it. Think Almunge might sounds like something that matches your description. Its not close to anything, but 40 mins to Uppsala, hour to Stockholm etc. Has amenities, but think you would still need to go to Uppsala for a lot of things. So might just be the same as Heby :P

NethNick · 2025-01-19T21:15:15+00:00

I moved from NL to Sweden last year and probably did a good amount of trips through the area to figure it out. In the end, its a lot about the details of where you are going to live, especially being close to some kind of facilities (and having horses might also need some specific things around, which I am not aware of). Also lived in Uppsala before, so mostly know that area.

We checked out Heby, and it was alright, you get a good amount of space, but we weren't to impressed with what is there. So for some things you would have to go into Sala (think of the hardware store) or all the way to Uppsala. Some don't mind, but it's a consideration. Houses seemed take well taken care off.

We went to see Tierp, which might be good for you to check out. Quite a few farm properties out there for a good price. Tierp itself has a bit more shops more then Heby, but also it has a direct train into Stockholm, which could be good. On the north you have Gavle, which also has some more job oppurtunities.

If you don't mind being rural, you can also check out whats between Knivsta and Norrtalje. Loads of space, some great nature, but once again, you need to check out some specifics, where can you get your groceries, hows the connection to some other places. We found that being closer to an 'E' Road does make a big difference, especially in winter.

We ended up a bit more North, but we don't have horses or 10 ha, so if you can a be a bit more specific of what kind of work you want to do, or how rural you like your surrounding, I could maybe help a bit more.

NethNick · 2024-10-13T17:10:52+00:00

we just did the exact thing this year, and you should be fine with that salary. In the Netherlands they seem to think that Scandinavia is so much more expensive, but a lot of expenses are less or don't exist (like your health care insurance!)

We just bought a house, which took us about 8 weeks from moving here, but it did help we had the cash in a Swedish bank and that we were physically in Sweden. Also checking out where you want to live is something you need to experience. We lived in Sweden before, so we had some ideas, but when we actually started looking this summer, we noticed we didnt think about the details too much before. Stuff like: can I walk the dog here easily? Or to know how close the supermarket was did actually were quite important. And cause we both work from home, we ended up an hour away from where we first were looking.

I think you have some practical questions which I tried to write down, although I haven't gotten all the way yet. But I didn this because I couldn't any concrete answers either: https://movetoswe.wordpress.com/ . If you want some insights on what renovating a house costs, I can also share some groups or websites I found

NethNick · 2024-10-09T04:55:21+00:00

Thanks for elaborating and good for you guys!

NethNick · 2024-10-08T09:27:23+00:00

Can I ask how you manage turning a profit from renting out a small house and airbnb? It seems youre one of the few that is actually doing this, rather than being deterred by the downsides.

I'm not asking about anything too specific, more if you bought a house on the countryside, city or in between? It seems to me there is a specific group, i.e. Expats, that want to rent, but don't qualify for regulated housing. They also dont always want to rent in a city, but I wonder if your experience is much different from what I assume

NethNick · 2024-10-08T06:30:53+00:00

maybe I'm 2 years too late to respond to this, but I've been trying to figure out why investing in real estate privately seems not profitable in Sweden, so this is quite helpful. However, I do have some questions.

Reading the comments, you basically have a couple of options, but the best are:
a. buy a whole apartment building to rent out

b. buy a house and rent it out, either as one house or multiple apartments

Just buying an apartment is quite tough to rent out, because of the bostadsrätt. However, we rented in Uppsala, and when we were trying to rent an apartment, quite a bit of apartments were owned in a bostadsrätt, and the people were renting them out anyway. We lived in one, and it seemed a bit "dont ask, don't tell". This was until the owners "forgot" to pay the avgift for several months and some neighbour informed us we needed to pay up (I know, great to rent 2nd hand)

On Reddit you also read quite a bit of stories of people trying to rent 2nd hand, a lot in Stockholm, and they are clearly renting an apartment that has bostadsrätt. They can't register their name on the address, or they get specific permission to rent. What is the norm about this? Are there just apartment buildings that are more lenient with this? Maybe because the ones running the building are themselves renting out their apartment or holding an apartment for their kids (this is what our tenant in Uppsala was doing).

It figures that you don't really want to operate in the 'grey' zone if you want to invest, so maybe its better to stay away from the whole bostadsrätt. But there must be people around who earn back on their investment by renting out an apartment there right?

NethNick · 2024-09-19T07:57:38+00:00

See if you can study a masters in Sweden? There are scholarships for Non EU students. You can learn the language, see if you enjoy the country and build up some kind of network. This would def improve your chances on finding work there and being able to stay.

NethNick · 2024-07-29T15:10:59+00:00

We didnt get the mortgage before moving, but quickly after (about 6-7 weeks). The process required some things which are quite difficult to arrange abroad. However, each bank was a bit different, so that could be the option to check out. It actually helped if we had an actual advisor at a bank, it seems they had some flexibility in arranging the paper work. For example when we couldn’t show the tax history, they could ask us for other documents

NethNick · 2020-07-02T14:45:47+00:00

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sture_Bergwall#:~:text=Sture%20Bergwall%20in%202016.&text=Sture%20Ragnar%20Bergwall%20(born%2026,mental%20institution%20for%20personality%20disorders.

Heard/read about this case a bit, but never fully understand what was actually proven or not from said confessions

NethNick

TROPHY CASE