What changes financially when you move to Sweden?
Tick where your income comes from. You then see which rules Sweden and the Netherlands apply to your situation: which country may tax you, which schemes exist and how you get insured. With the source, so you can check it yourself.
This applies to everyone who moves. Tick above what applies to you, and the rest will appear.
Health insurance
How do you get insured, and what do you pay for it?
You pay per visit, up to a ceiling
You pay no premium and have no policy and no excess. You do pay a co-payment per healthcare visit, and a national ceiling limits what you spend on it.
That co-payment is called patientavgift, and each region sets its own. If you pay more than the ceiling within twelve months, the rest of that period is free. You then get a frikort (exemption card), valid throughout the country. That happens automatically. Prescription medicines have their own scale with a separate ceiling. Beyond that there is no financial risk from healthcare in Sweden. That is a reassurance the Dutch excess has never given.
- healthcare ceiling per 12 months (2026)
- 1,450 kronor
Source: 1177 — the högkostnadsskydd for outpatient care: the ceiling and the frikort — checked on 2026-08-28
Read the whole storyWhat the Netherlands doesn't let go of
Which Dutch obligation travels with you?
Your AOW accrual stops on departure, but can be repaired within one year
This is about the accrual, not 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. Every year until your AOW age then costs 2% of your later AOW. If you already receive AOW, this no longer applies.
For most emigrants the insurance ends at the moment of departure. If you keep working in the Netherlands or are posted abroad, you can stay insured. Voluntary continued insurance with the SVB (the Social Insurance Bank, which pays the AOW) closes the gap, for ten years at most. That is only possible if your application is in within one year of your compulsory insurance ending. And you must have been insured for at least a year directly before that. The premium depends on your income and is revised annually, so no amount is given here. Put that date in your diary before you go.
- reduction per uninsured year
- 2% of your AOW
- application for voluntary insurance
- no later than 1 year after your insurance ends
- duration of voluntary insurance
- 10 years at most
Source: Algemene Ouderdomswet (General Old Age Pensions Act) — article 13(1) (2% reduction per uninsured calendar year), article 35(1) (voluntary insurance, ten years at most) and article 36(1) (application no later than one year after the compulsory insurance ends) — checked on 2026-09-19
Read the whole storyYour Dutch basic health insurance ends when you deregister
Your basic insurance stops on the day you deregister. Not on 31 December, and not if you let it run on.
The insurance belongs to living in the Netherlands, and that stops. What replaces it depends on your route. Once your folkbokföring is complete, you get care at the patient rate. In the weeks before, you use the EHIC or the S1. Count on those quiet weeks: the processing time at Skatteverket is precisely the gap you cover before departure.
Where this comes from: Description from the knowledge article on Swedish healthcare costs: access hangs on the folkbokföring, and in the weeks before that you fall back on the EHIC or S1.
Read the whole storyFor inheritance and gifts the Netherlands counts you in for ten years, but the treaty may set inheritance aside
The Inheritance Tax Act (Successiewet), the law on inheritance and gift tax, pretends an emigrated Dutch national still lives in the Netherlands for ten years, on death and for gifts. The inheritance tax treaty with Sweden may set that aside on death. Have a tax adviser check whether that applies to you. For gifts the ten-year rule still applies.
The treaty from 1952 only covers estates and has no rule on nationality. Under the treaty, what is not real estate or a business may only be taxed by the country where you live. Residence there means where you permanently stay, with the clear intention of remaining there. What you give away in the first ten years, to your children for example, does fall under Dutch gift tax. For a gift in the first year after you leave, that even applies to everyone who lived in the Netherlands, also without Dutch nationality. So review your will and your gift plans before you leave.
- deemed residence for gifts
- 10 years
- deemed residence on death
- 10 years, unless the treaty sets it aside
This is not tax advice
These are the rules that apply to your situation. What they add up to is not shown here. With Sweden, timing matters as well. Today the 1991 treaty applies. The new treaty, signed on 24 June 2026, will reverse the taxation of pensions once it has been ratified. What that together means for your pension and assets is for a tax adviser who knows both systems to work out. Take this list to that conversation: then you know which questions to ask.
Still deciding between countries? Put the rules of two or three countries side by side
Then actually doing it
Knowing which rules apply is the first half. The second is applying them in time: in the right order, without missing a deadline, and with your documents at hand.
Every step on one list, free
Not ready to start yet? Then you get the departure checklist for Sweden: 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 Sweden 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.