The step-by-step plan for Mexico

In this step you learn which residence card suits you and how to get it. Mexico has two cards for whoever wants to stay.

The residente temporal (temporary resident) is the route of almost everyone. This is how it works:

• You apply for a visa at the consulate and show there that you have enough means.
• Within thirty days of arrival you collect the card at the INM, the Mexican immigration service.
• The card is valid for one year at first. Then you renew up to four years in total, and after that you become permanent.

The residente permanente (permanent resident) goes through the same gate, but is for good at once. That card is only for whoever has a pension and clears a higher bar.

The thresholds aren't in pesos but in UMA days. The UMA is a Mexican unit of account that is adjusted every year in February. That quietly makes the amounts on old consulate pages untrue. This plan works with the UMA of 2026.

One thing is different with Mexico than with most destinations. You can only make the application at a consulate outside Mexico. If you're already in the country as a tourist and want to stay, you fly back to The Hague. That is no punishment but the rule. It's why phase 2 lies before your departure.

In this step you see what emigrating to Mexico does to your tax, your AOW (the Dutch state pension) and your healthcare. Almost no Dutch-language page puts those three things together.

The tax. The tax treaty of 1993 splits your income in three:

• Your occupational pension and your annuity are taxable only in Mexico. The Netherlands lets go of them once you have the exemption.
• The Netherlands may keep taxing your AOW, but at no more than 17.5 percent of the gross. Mexico credits that: it takes into account what you already pay in the Netherlands.
• Your government pension stays Dutch, unless you also become Mexican.

The AOW itself. Mexico is no treaty country under the Wet BEU (the Dutch Benefits Export Restriction Act). So the accrued AOW comes along up to the married rate, the amount for someone who is married or living together. For a couple nothing changes. Whoever goes alone falls back from seventy to fifty percent of the net minimum wage. If you still receive an AOW supplement for a younger partner, it stops. That supplement was abolished in 2015. Only people who already had it keep it.

The healthcare. Mexico isn't on the list of treaty countries for healthcare either. So there is no CAK, the Dutch body that arranges your healthcare in treaty countries, and no treaty contribution. Your Dutch basic insurance ends when you deregister. After that a policy is your healthcare system: a private one, or the voluntary IMSS package of Mexican social security, with its exclusions.

Your AOW accrual stops. That's something different from the payment. What you've built up until you leave stays yours. But as soon as you're no longer insured in the Netherlands, you build up nothing more. For most emigrants that is the moment of departure. Every year until your AOW age then costs you 2% of your later AOW. You can continue your insurance voluntarily with the SVB, for ten years at most. But the application has to be in within one year of your insurance ending. After that the door is closed. If you already receive AOW, this no longer applies.

In this step you choose where in Mexico you want to live. Holiday Mexico and living Mexico are two different countries:

• The Riviera Maya and Los Cabos have the flights, the English and the prices of Florida.
• The highlands have the climate you live in all year, the Mexican prices and the largest foreign communities in the country. Think of Querétaro, San Miguel de Allende, Guadalajara and Lake Chapala.

Factor two things into that choice that don't stand out on holiday. The first is healthcare. Where you live decides which hospital is within reach. Private healthcare in the big cities is excellent, but expensive. The second is land. The coastal strip is constitutionally restricted zone. There you can only buy through a fideicomiso: a bank holds the land for you. More on that in phase 5.

In this step you see what the move is going to cost you. On the application side Mexico is affordable. The visa costs 990.79 pesos in fees, about 45 to 50 euros. The card for the first year costs 11,140.74 pesos, the permanent card 13,578.96.

The money sits in three other items:

• The health policy that replaces the CAK.
• The move across the ocean.
• The car, because it almost never comes along.

In this conversation you decide together whether Mexico fits, and when. You end up with a few conditions on paper that you both stand behind.

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, with a week in between:

• Evening 1, why. What do we hope to find in Mexico? 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 arranged 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 sheet.

With Mexico there's one hard rule you have to see together. The AOW fallback hits only whoever goes alone. The health policy hits whoever is older the hardest, because insurers take almost nobody new above seventy. If you're close to that limit, you decide here not only whether you go but also when.

Discuss the distance too. Eleven hours' flying is no weekend home. And the time difference of seven or eight hours turns every phone call with the Netherlands into an appointment.

Divide the work. Agree who takes on which part of this plan: the papers for the visa, 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 can both see what's done.

Is one of you going without an income of your own? Whoever lives in Mexico and doesn't work in the Netherlands usually no longer builds up AOW. For every year you're not insured, you later get 2 percent less AOW. From the moment you're no longer insured, you have one year to take out voluntary insurance with the SVB. Also discuss whether that partner keeps an account and money of their own, and how you decide together on big expenses.

Married, registered or living together? It can make a difference for your partner's residence permit, for co-insurance in healthcare and for inheritance. In Mexico your partner comes along through the unidad familiar, family unity. A partner you live with can come along too. You then hand in official proof of cohabitation instead of the marriage certificate. Your partner's card runs with yours: if one lapses, so does the other. Check at the visa and at your healthcare further on in your plan what else 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 habits, like 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, like their room.
• Teenagers: involve them in the decision itself. For them, saying goodbye to friends weighs heaviest. Agree how they keep in touch and when they see their friends again.

In Mexico the school year starts at the end of August. For 2026-2027 that's on 31 August. Time your departure for it if you can.

Who learns the language, and when? Already for the application, documents that aren't in Spanish need a Spanish translation. Count on daily life being in Spanish too. Often the partner without work needs the language most, and precisely that partner has no colleagues to practise with. Plan it together, preferably before you leave.

In this step you choose the date you want to leave. From that date you count everything back. These clocks decide your planning:

• The tightest is in phase 5. Within thirty days of arrival you have to be at the INM for the card.
• The longest is in phase 3. The health policy has to be accepted before you deregister, and acceptance takes insurers weeks.