The step-by-step plan for Curaçao

In this step you find out why Curaçao feels close, but is a different country when it comes to the rules.

Curaçao is an autonomous country within the Kingdom. It isn't a municipality of the Netherlands. It isn't the Caribbean Netherlands either, like Bonaire. Bonaire is a Dutch special municipality, with a different regime and a counter of its own. So don't confuse the two.

Your Dutch passport gives you the right to live on Curaçao. The law calls that admission by operation of law: the right follows directly from the law. Three conditions do apply:

• You have sufficient means of subsistence.
• You have suitable housing.
• You show good conduct.

You have that right laid down in a declaration. After that follows a chain of registrations you have to know.

Meanwhile, for every Dutch authority this is an ordinary emigration. Your health insurance stops, your benefits stop and your AOW accrual stops. So the same passport, but treat the move as what it is: an emigration without a language barrier.

After this step you know how you earn your money on Curaçao and how you're insured for healthcare. Two things fall the right way here.

Working is allowed without a work permit. The employment law has a ban on working without a permit, but that ban doesn't apply to whoever is admitted by operation of law. So you can apply for jobs and start a business, just as in the Netherlands. Only the salaries are lower there.

Healthcare depends on where you live. As a resident (an inhabitant of the island) you fall under the basic health insurance (bvz), Curaçao's basic insurance. The contribution is 13.6% of your income, or 6.5% if you're a pensioner. You pay it via tax.

The sting is in the word "resident". You only are one after your registration at Kranshi, the population register of Curaçao. For that you first need your declaration by operation of law: your residence title (the document that records your right of residence). Between your departure from the Netherlands and that moment you're insured nowhere. You close that bridging gap in phase 2.

Are you a pensioner? Then there is no CAK route as in the EU. Through the CAK, pensioners in the EU stay insured from the Netherlands; here the bvz is your system. And the penshonado question decides your tax burden: do you opt for the penshonado scheme, a separate tax scheme for pensioners, or not? That question comes back in phase 2.

A trial stay shows you what life on Curaçao is really like, and not just what the holiday was like. Holiday Curaçao and living Curaçao are two different islands. Three things surprise most people:

• The neighbourhood decides your rent. Around Jan Thiel and Blue Bay, where many expats live, you pay European prices. Outside it the rent drops fast.
• The groceries come by boat, and you see that in the price.
• The electricity bill of an air-conditioned home is higher than anyone expects.

So go and live there on trial. Stay a few weeks outside the high season, in an ordinary neighbourhood, and do your shopping at an ordinary supermarket.

Also look honestly at the rainy season. It runs from October through December. The island lies outside the hurricane belt, but it's hot then and there are showers. And look at what the island doesn't have: the anonymity, the choice and the variation of four seasons you know from the Netherlands. Whoever knows the island and still wants it, really wants it.

With this step you know whether your budget can carry the move and the first months. The calculator for Curaçao works with your own moving choices.

The paperwork here costs a few hundred euros. The declaration by operation of law is the biggest item. The real money is in the sea container and in the first months on an import island, where almost everything comes from abroad. Work the container out early. It isn't just the biggest item, it also sets the pace of your whole planning.

A rule of thumb: don't count yourself rich on a quick job at a Dutch salary. Wages are lower there. Whoever builds their budget on the Dutch payslip runs short in the first year.

With this conversation you know whether everyone in the family stands behind the move. There are no forms involved, and yet this is where most journeys fail.

Going alone? Then have this conversation with the people you leave behind. The questions below work for them too.

Take three evenings. One conversation is too short for a decision like this. Agree on three evenings, a week apart:

• Evening 1, why. What do we hope to find on Curaçao? What are we leaving behind here? Would that really be different there?
• Evening 2, what we give up. Who and what will we miss? What are we dreading most? What do we do if it disappoints?
• Evening 3, the conditions. What has to be in place for each of us to say yes? When do we check together whether it's going well, for example after six and after twelve months? And what would be a reason for us to go back?

Write the conditions down. On the kitchen-table card it all fits on one A4.

With Curaçao the heavy point isn't the language, but the distance. You don't just fly back and forth for a birthday. And family visits less often than everyone promises at the farewell. Take that along on the second evening.

Divide the work. Agree who takes on which part of this plan: the papers, the house and the cancellations, the school, the move. That way not one of you carries everything. Invite your partner into your plan; then you both see what's done.

Is one of you going without an income of your own? Even within the Kingdom, the SVB counts Curaçao as living outside the Netherlands. So whoever lives on Curaçao and doesn't work in the Netherlands usually no longer builds up AOW, the Dutch state pension. For every year you're not insured, you later get 2 percent less AOW. You can insure yourself voluntarily with the SVB. You have one year for that, counted from the moment you're no longer insured. Also discuss whether that partner keeps an account and money of their own, and how you decide together on large expenses.

Married, registered or living together? That can make a difference for your partner's residence permit, for co-insurance in healthcare and for inheritance. As a Dutch national you're admitted to Curaçao by operation of law. If your partner is Dutch too, they apply for a declaration of their own. If your partner has another nationality, admission by operation of law doesn't apply, not even after a marriage. Your partner then needs a permit of their own. Check at the declaration of admission by operation of law and at your healthcare further on in your plan what applies to you.

Are children coming? How you tell them depends on their age:

• Up to about four. Tell them shortly before the move and keep fixed routines, such as the bedtime ritual and the cuddly toy in the hand luggage.
• Primary school. Tell them well in advance and let them look along: photos of the school, the neighbourhood and the house. Let them choose something, such as their room.
• Teenagers. Involve them in the decision itself. For them, saying goodbye to friends weighs the most. Agree how they keep in touch and when they'll see their friends again.

For children, the choice of school on Curaçao is a bigger decision than in the Netherlands. Language, curriculum and costs vary widely there. Phase 5 works that out, and so does the article about school with this step; read it before this conversation.

Who learns the language, and when? With Dutch you get a fair way on Curaçao. But Papiamentu is the language most people on the island speak, and most schools are bilingual. Often the partner without work needs that language most, and that's exactly the one without colleagues to practise with. Plan it together, preferably before you leave.

With a target date for departure you close the orientation phase. See it not as a deadline, but as a compass.

Two clocks set the pace here:

• The declaration by operation of law. It has a legal decision period of four months, and you can await it on the island.
• The container, which spends weeks at sea.

A realistic picture: from serious decision to everything settled, this journey takes most people four to nine months.

Fill in your target date below in this card. That completes this step. You can always adjust the date; the planning adjusts with it.