Your household goods to Germany: no customs, but a parking ban that takes four weeks

Taking your household goods to Germany costs no form: the German customs service itself writes that you may bring goods for your own use from any EU country without duty, and for removal goods there is no declaration, no exemption and no deadline. It is the shortest move of all destinations on this site — a few hours' drive, at most a day to Bavaria. The pitfalls therefore sit not at the border but in the German habit of arranging everything before it happens: you request the parking ban for the removal van from the district (Berlin: from € 21, count on four weeks), within two weeks of the keys you register at the Bürgeramt, and the car is a story of its own with a clock of thirteen weeks.

Do I have to declare anything at the border?

No. The Zoll names three exceptions to free movement: goods that are subject to a permit or a ban in Germany, such as medicines and fireworks; cash from € 10,000, which you must declare on request; and excise goods. For the latter, European guideline values apply that customs use to test "own use":

Goods	EU guideline value for own use
Cigarettes	800
Smoking tobacco	1 kg
Spirits	10 litres
Fortified wine	20 litres
Wine	90 litres, of which 60 sparkling
Beer	110 litres

Whoever moves their wine cellar puts the receipts on top. For medicines separate rules apply.

Which clocks do run?

The German move has four deadlines, and none of them is a customs deadline.

Clock	Deadline	Where
Parking ban for the removal van (Haltverbot)	about four weeks' processing; Berlin from € 21	the district's Straßenverkehrsbehörde, at the old and the new home
Anmeldung	within two weeks of moving in	the Bürgeramt
Rundfunkbeitrag	the letter comes by itself after the Anmeldung; not replying means registration with retroactive effect	the Beitragsservice
Car: bpm refund	registered in Germany within thirteen weeks of the export status at the RDW	RDW, Tax Administration, Zulassungsstelle

The Haltverbot. In German cities the removal van doesn't just park in front of the door. You request a temporary parking ban from the district's traffic authority, informally, and receive an order — but no signs. Berlin says it plainly: whoever has no signs hires them from a firm allowed to put them up. Request it as soon as the moving date is fixed; four weeks is the average processing time, and it applies to the street you leave and the one you arrive in.

The Anmeldung. Two weeks after the day you move in, not after the day the boxes are unpacked. The landlord is obliged to give you a Wohnungsgeberbestätigung; without that paper no registration, and without registration nothing else starts.

The Rundfunkbeitrag. The Bürgeramt passes your details to the Beitragsservice and the letter follows by itself. One fee per home, so whoever lives together lets one person pay and reports the existing number.

How do I move, and what does it cost?

Germany is close enough to move in stages: many families drive back and forth themselves a few times with a trailer and have only the heavy work done by a mover. Get quotes by volume and compare the part load — your things share the truck — with a truck of your own; the price difference is large and the distance short. What it roughly comes to is worked out by the cost indication for Germany; those are estimates, not tariffs.

Two German peculiarities for furnishing. Rental homes are often handed over without a kitchen — ask before you give away the Dutch one. And German buildings know the Kehrwoche and the stairwell the neighbours share: whoever blocks the stairwell with boxes on day one doesn't start well.

What does not simply come along?

The car. As soon as its regular location is in Germany, it belongs on German plates. On the Dutch side you file the export notification at the RDW (€ 12, then fourteen days of driving on white export plates) and reclaim the bpm, provided the German registration is done within thirteen weeks of the export status — the car article shows why that yields money for many cars.

The pet. Microchip, rabies vaccination at least 21 days old and a European pet passport; then the German dog rules, see the pet article.

Thirteen weeks is the only hard deadline of this move. The household goods may come months later; the bpm refund may not. Don't file the RDW export notification too early — the thirteen weeks start on the day the RDW records the Export status, and the German Zulassung can only happen after the Anmeldung.

In Vertrekklaar this is phase 3 of 5 of the journey, step 3.1: the same steps, but for your situation — in your order, tickable, and with the deadlines watched. See the whole journey to Germany or go straight to step 3.1 in the open plan.