Bermuda · Visa required
Emigrating to Bermuda
With a Dutch passport you can go to Bermuda without a visa, as a visitor for at most six months in twelve. Living there is only possible with permission from Immigration, and it depends on a reason: a job for which your employer applies for a work permit, a Bermudian partner, an income of your own of at least 75,000 dollars a year, or an investment from 2.5 million. There's no separate retirement route. Bermuda levies no income tax, and the tax treaty gives your AOW to Bermuda: so it's untaxed there. But there's no AOW treaty, so whoever goes alone gets the AOW for married people. And no CAK: a Bermudian health policy easily costs 440 dollars per person a month.
€ 399 one-off · 41 steps · no subscription
- Kind of journey
- Permission from Immigration on one of four grounds: a work permit through your employer, a Bermudian partner, your own income (Permission to Reside) or investing (EIRC)
- The clock
- As a visitor at most six months in twelve; with your own income or as an investor at least ninety days a year on the island
- Note
- No retirement route and no AOW treaty, so a single person gets the AOW for married people; but a tax treaty, and no income tax; no CAK
Last updated: 26 October 2026
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Five phases, from the six months as a visitor to your own place on the island
This journey turns on one question: on what ground may you stay? As a visitor you may be in Bermuda at most six months a year, and you may not look for work. To live there you need permission from Immigration. For work your employer applies for a work permit, after first showing that no Bermudian can do the job. Whoever doesn't work shows an income of at least 75,000 dollars a year and a health policy of their own. On top of that there's what the brochure doesn't mention: your AOW is untaxed in Bermuda, but without an AOW treaty a single person gets the amount for married people.
- Orientation
Six months as a visitor, four routes, and an AOW without a treaty
In this phase you learn how living in Bermuda works, and what it does to your income and your healthcare. As a visitor you may stay at most six months in twelve. Whoever wants to live there chooses a route: work, a Bermudian partner, your own income or investing. The programme for digital nomads stopped in 2025; whoever works remotely for abroad now chooses the own-income route. There's no retirement route. There's no AOW treaty, so a single person gets about 30 percent less AOW. But there is a tax treaty: it gives your AOW to Bermuda, and Bermuda levies no income tax.Read more
- Your visa
Choosing a route, papers with an apostille, and the application to Immigration
In this phase you arrange your ground to stay. For work your employer applies for the work permit, after advertising in the newspaper and on the government's job board; some occupations are closed to foreigners. An English language test is part of it, unless your diploma is in English. With a Bermudian spouse you live and work without a work permit. Whoever lives on their own income shows 75,000 dollars a year and a health policy, and is on the island at least ninety days a year. Your papers get an apostille, and your certificate of conduct is at most six months old when you apply.Read more
- Closing the Netherlands
An untaxed AOW, but the AOW for married people if you go alone, and no CAK
In this phase you work through the familiar list for closing down in the Netherlands. Your AOW goes along, but without an AOW treaty a single person gets the amount for married people, and child benefit, the allowances and unemployment benefit stop. The tax treaty gives your AOW to Bermuda, which levies no income tax; ask the SVB for an exemption from payroll tax. Your occupational pension goes to Bermuda too, unless your contributions were deductible and together you receive more than 10,000 euros a year. An ABP pension stays taxed in the Netherlands. There's no CAK, and whoever leaves before the AOW age can insure themselves voluntarily within one year.Read more
- The move
Household goods free on arrival, the car stays here
In this phase you move the household goods, the car and the pet. With a Transfer of Residence Certificate, which you get free on arrival, you bring things you've had for more than six months without import duties; otherwise you pay 25 percent. A car can almost never come: it has to be new and small enough, and the import duty is 75 to 150 percent. So sell it here. Your dog or cat needs an import permit, a microchip and two rabies jabs, and has to be at least ten months old; a blood test isn't needed, not for the way back either.Read more
- Arrival in Bermuda
Your stay and your household goods on arrival, then healthcare, bank, driving test and home
In this phase you arrange your stay, your healthcare, your driving licence and your home after landing. You ask for your household goods certificate straight away at the airport. If you work, your employer insures you for healthcare and may deduct at most half of the premium. The TCD doesn't mention exchanging your licence: expect a theory and a practical test, and check with the TCD. You drive on the left, at most 35 kilometres an hour. Renting is possible without a licence; buying only above a high value threshold, with a licence of 8 or 12.5 percent of the purchase price, and an ordinary apartment not with only a work permit.Read more
This is what one step of your plan looks like
This is the real thing: one of the steps of the journey to Bermuda, exactly as it appears in your personal step-by-step plan, with the deadlines, the offices and the sources.
Step 3.2 of your plan
Know where you pay tax: the 2009 treaty
- Lead time
- one good conversation with a tax adviser
- Costs
- advisory hours, depending on your situation
In this step you learn which country taxes which income. For your AOW the answer is favourable: your AOW is untaxed.
That comes from two things together. The Netherlands and Bermuda have a tax treaty, from 2009, for ordinary people. It says that only Bermuda may tax your AOW if you live there. And Bermuda levies no income tax. So the Netherlands may not, and Bermuda doesn't.
Per type of income:
- Your AOW and your Anw only Bermuda taxes, and that doesn't happen. Without action, the SVB does withhold wage tax. So ask the SVB for an exemption from wage tax.
- Your company pension and your annuity also go to Bermuda, with one exception. If the premiums were deductible in the Netherlands, and you receive more than 10,000 euros gross a year together, the Netherlands may tax. Whether that's on everything or only on the part above 10,000 euros, the text doesn't say clearly. Have your tax adviser check it.
- A government pension from ABP, for work in government, the Netherlands taxes.
- A lump sum from a pension or annuity that hasn't started yet, the Netherlands may tax.
- The WW and the WIA follow the same rule as the company pension, with the limit of 10,000 euros.
Your company pension. If you stay below the limit, also ask your pension fund to stop withholding wage tax. For that you apply for an exemption at the Tax Administration. Bermuda has no income tax and so no tax return either. Ask the Tax Administration which proof that you live in Bermuda they want to see.
No tax credit. For the Tax Administration Bermuda falls under "other countries". What the Netherlands still taxes, it taxes without the tax part of the tax credits. The SVB also gives no credit for the tax part on your AOW.
For the year of your departure you file a return in the Netherlands with the M form, online via Mijn Belastingdienst or on paper.
Take this to a tax adviser and have him calculate what you keep net. You need that number before you give notice on your rent.
What this step rests on
- Wetten.overheid.nl — the tax treaty with Bermuda for individuals, since 1 February 2010: articles 2, 4, 8 and 9
- Tax Administration — Treaty states income tax non-residents, January 2026: Bermuda, the AOW without exception, and the limit of 10,000 euros
- Office of the Tax Commissioner — no income tax for individuals
- SVB — what is deducted from your AOW outside the Netherlands: exemption from wage tax, and no credit for the tax part
- Tax Administration — requesting an exemption from wage tax, with a statement from your country of residence
- Tax Administration — which deductions and credits you have if you live outside the Netherlands
- Tax Administration — filing for the year of emigration: online or with the M form
And this is the dashboard that step lives in. The example shows the plan for Spain; your dashboard shows the plan for Bermuda.
This is step 3.2 of 41. The other 40 are ready for you, each with the same sources, the same offices and a schedule that keeps track of your dates.
See all 41 steps for BermudaWhat you get for € 399
All 41 steps to Bermuda, for your situation
In order, with the office and the official source at every step. Steps that don't apply to you don't appear.
Your deadlines in one place
For each step you see the latest date to start, and you get a heads-up before something is due or expires. Your documents sit in the vault, with their dates.
A plan that stays right
Twice a month we check the sources. If something changes, it's in your plan and you get a message.
The step-by-step plan for Bermuda
€ 399
one-off · 41 steps
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Every step on one list, free
Not ready to start yet? Then you get the departure checklist for Bermuda: every step in order, to print and tick off. With it, five mails in a week and a half about the pitfalls and the real costs. If the rules for Bermuda change, you'll hear about it. After that we ask once where your plans stand, send one offer, and now and then one thing that fits your moment. No newsletter, and you can switch it off at any time.
That was the move. And once you live there?
Which country may tax your pension once you live in Bermuda? Is there a favourable regime, a scheme that lowers your tax? And how do you get insured? That depends on where your income comes from. Tick it and you'll see which rules apply to you, with the source.
See the financial conditionsClosing down the Netherlands: all your letters in one go
Moving to Bermuda starts with leaving the Netherlands properly. That's why the plan includes the letter tool: you enter your details once and every cancellation and notification letter is ready.
Just the letters, without the plan? That works too, for € 49
- Health insurance, rent, energy, subscriptions, GP, school, bank and pension fund: 16 kinds of letters. You enter your details only once.
- A sending list that counts back from your departure date and your notice period, even when that's three months.
- Also what you need to ask for as an emigrant: your no-claims years in English, your medical file and the school report (the report on your child for the new school).
Auke, maker of Vertrekklaar
On 2 January we're leaving ourselves, on a trip around the world with our family. What I put here, I'm arranging for my own family too.
On 20 September 2026 a customer wrote that the CAK rule for early retirement was missing from his plan. He was right. That evening the step was in thirteen plans, with the source attached.
The knowledge base on Bermuda
Per phase, the articles that are already there. They're written from the same journey and go deeper than what fits above.
- The residence routes to Bermuda: work, a Bermudian partner, your own income or investingWith a Dutch passport you may spend up to six months in any twelve months in Bermuda without a visa, but you may not work or look for work. Living there is only possible with permission from Immigration, through four routes: work, a Bermudian partner, your own income of at least 75,000 dollars a year, or an investment of 2.5 million dollars. The nomad programme ended in 2025, and there is no retirement visa.
- Working in Bermuda: the work permit, the English test, and what you pay in payroll tax and contributionsYou can only work in Bermuda with a work permit, and your employer applies for it, after an advertisement in which Bermudians go first. For 48 occupations it is not possible. Your employer also shows that you speak enough English. There is no income tax, but there is payroll tax of 0.25 to 12.5 percent and a pension contribution of 39.25 dollars a week.
- AOW, pension and tax in Bermuda: untaxed AOW, but no social security agreementThe Netherlands and Bermuda have had a tax treaty since 2010. As a result only Bermuda may tax your AOW, and Bermuda levies no income tax. There is no social security agreement: a single person gets the AOW for married people, about 30 percent less. Pension and annuity go to Bermuda too. Above 10,000 euros gross a year, and only if the premiums were deductible, the Netherlands may tax; whether that covers the whole amount, check. The Netherlands always taxes an ABP pension.
- Dog or cat to Bermuda: an import permit, two rabies shots, and no blood testYour dog or cat may come to Bermuda with an import permit, a chip and two rabies vaccinations, the second 6 to 12 months after the first. The animal is at least 10 months old. A titre test is not required. The health certificate is at most 10 days old on arrival. There is no quarantine: if something is not right, your pet goes straight back.
- Household goods to Bermuda: duty-free with a Transfer of Residence Certificate, otherwise 25%If you come to live in Bermuda for the first time, you bring your used household goods free of import duty. You show that you may live there, and you have owned the goods for more than six months. If you ship them, you ask for a free Transfer of Residence Certificate at the airport on arrival. Whatever is not exempt usually costs 25% import duty plus 1.25% wharfage.
- Car and driving licence in Bermuda: one car per dwelling, your car stays behind, and expect a new testYour car from the Netherlands can almost never enter Bermuda: you must be the first owner, have had it for at most six months, and it must be small enough. Import duty is 75% on the first $10,000 and 150% above that, except for a fully electric car. Only one car may be registered per dwelling. The TCD does not mention exchanging a licence: expect a theory and a practical test, and check with the TCD.
All 13 articles about Bermuda
- Banking and payments in Bermuda: an account with your work permit, the dollar and 1.25 percent on euros
- The first weeks in Bermuda: your papers at the border, your belongings duty-free, your number and your health care
- Buying a home in Bermuda: only with a licence, above a set rental value, and with 12.5% on top
- Renting in Bermuda: up to five years without a licence, and what your lease means for everything else
- Registration in Bermuda: your residence document, the social insurance number and the Dutch consul
- School in Bermuda: free public education for every child who lives there, and registration in November
- Health care in Bermuda: no CAK, a policy through your employer or your own, and one hospital
Also applies to your move
Ready to begin?
The step-by-step plan for Bermuda: 41 steps, with your documents and your costs in one place. For each step you see the latest date to start. You pay once and it's yours.