The step-by-step plan for South Africa

With this step you understand how your residence works here, and where it takes time. Unlike in the EU, your residence here is a visa. You apply for it before departure. Each route has its own requirements, and the visa has an end date that you have to watch.

Honestly, up front: the Department of Home Affairs (the South African ministry that decides on visas and residence) is notorious for its processing times.

The embassy in The Hague gives these processing times, counted from your appointment:

• A residence visa, such as the retirement visa or a work visa: up to eight weeks.
• Permanent residence: up to eighteen months.

It can also take longer. The government itself acknowledges the backlogs: it has collectively extended pending applications. That's no reason to give up. It is the reason this journey revolves around timing.

One rule you have to know from day one. If you stay even a single day longer than your visa allows (an overstay), you're marked as an "undesirable person" on departure.

That brings an entry ban:

• If you overstay by up to 30 days, the ban is one year.
• If you overstay by longer, it's five years.

So submit an extension well in time. The step-by-step plan watches that clock.

With this step you see which route fits you. That choice decides everything after this.

There are four main routes, each with its own sum:

• The retired person visa (the retirement visa) is for whoever shows R 37,000 a month in pension or investment income. Your partner and children can come along on an appropriate visa, without their own income requirement. If your partner wants a retirement visa of their own too, they also show that R 37,000.
• The financially independent route is for whoever has R 12 million in net assets and wants direct permanent residence.
• The remote work visa is for whoever brings their Dutch work along. The requirement is R 650,796 gross a year.
• The work routes run via the points system. The fastest way there is the Critical Skills List, the list of sought-after occupations, with many technical tradespeople.

If you have a South African partner, there's also the spousal route (the route for partners). With it you arrange the work endorsement, your permission to work, separately. In phase 2 you work out the chosen route.

With this step you see what the move is going to cost you.

The big items here are different from Europe:

• The container. The shipment is six to ten weeks in transit.
• Healthcare. Private health insurance is your own responsibility from day one.
• The pet. The crossing runs into thousands of euros.

Against that, life itself is considerably cheaper. Rents are a third to half of the Dutch level. Work it out with your own choices. The car doesn't need to be in the sum, because it can't come.

With this step you decide together whether you go. South Africa asks for a very honest conversation about it.

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

Take three evenings. One conversation is too short for a decision like this. Set aside three evenings, a week apart. Talk with your partner, and depending on their age with your children too:

• Evening 1, why. Why do we want this? What do we hope to find in South Africa? 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 needs 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 come back?

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

Four subjects belong on those evenings:

• Safety. The crime figures are high by Dutch standards. The risk depends on the neighbourhood and on your behaviour, and the figures are falling. But in the cities living behind security is the norm, and you have to want that.
• The distance. It's well over eleven hours of flying, and family doesn't just drop by. But there's no jet lag, because the time difference is zero to one hour.
• Healthcare in old age. Private healthcare is excellent, but the premium rises with the years. And there's no Dutch safety net.
• The outlook. The country has large social differences and unemployment above thirty percent. So start with open eyes, and preferably with your own income.

Whoever has this conversation honestly and still wants it has the best reason.

Divide the work. Agree who takes on which part of this plan: the visa 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? Someone who lives in South Africa and doesn't work in the Netherlands usually stops building up AOW. AOW is the Dutch state pension. 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? That can matter for your partner's visa, for being insured together for healthcare and for inheritance. With the retirement visa, your spouse and children can come along on an appropriate visa. If you have a South African partner, there's the spousal route, the route for partners. Check at the visa 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 heaviest. Agree how they'll stay in touch and when they'll see their friends again.

English is the language of instruction almost everywhere, and Afrikaans is a recognisable subject for Dutch children. The transition is gentler than with any other faraway destination. The school year runs with the calendar year.

Who learns the language, and when? In South Africa that's mainly English, and Afrikaans is recognisable for Dutch people. If one of you speaks little English, it's often the partner without work who needs it most, and that's exactly the one with no colleagues to practise with. Plan it together, preferably before you leave.

With this step you fix when you want to be standing in South Africa. Choose that date below. The step-by-step plan works out whether that's feasible with what still has to happen. The visa processing time is the longest item here.

From that moment the step-by-step plan watches the clocks: the six months that police clearances are valid, the two months for the pet permit, and the deadline to extend your visa.