Moving to Finland as an EU citizen

Bluemoons · Post by **Bluemoons** » Tue Jul 22, 2014 7:21 pm

Greetings:

First of all, I've been to Finland a couple times in the past two years and found it to be amazing. Now my intention (our intention, more on that next) is to move there within the next year.

As for money and savings, an account has been set up in Finland, so that's already taken care of as means to fund my (our) move. Now the real question is, in your experience (I've yet to contact migri about this matter) what would the the status of my girlfriend if she decided to move to Finland with me as she is not an EU citizen (we have been looking into student permits) if she decided to marry me over there?

Will she be able to live and work there without any issues if she was to marry me there? I am well aware of the language barriers and all. I'm just looking for insight as for her status if she married me in Finland.

Thanks in advance for any help.

Cheers.

**Sponsor:**

betelgeuse · Post by **betelgeuse** » Tue Jul 22, 2014 9:48 pm

Bluemoons wrote:Greetings:

First of all, I've been to Finland a couple times in the past two years and found it to be amazing. Now my intention (our intention, more on that next) is to move there within the next year.

As for money and savings, an account has been set up in Finland, so that's already taken care of as means to fund my (our) move. Now the real question is, in your experience (I've yet to contact migri about this matter) what would the the status of my girlfriend if she decided to move to Finland with me as she is not an EU citizen (we have been looking into student permits) if she decided to marry me over there?'

https://www.poliisi.fi/poliisi/home.nsf ... endocument

The EU free movement rights extend to family members of EU citizens. If you have cohabited for two years the marriage makes no difference. You will just have to show sufficient funds (no fixed amounts are defined) to cover the both of you.

GermanInHelsinki · Post by **GermanInHelsinki** » Tue Jul 22, 2014 9:54 pm

The real question is of course what you two want to do in Finland. How much money do you have on that bank account? How amazing are your Finnish skills? What formal qualifications do you have? The normal experience for a foreigner is of course that it takes several years before he finds a job in Finland.

Pursuivant · Post by **Pursuivant** » Tue Jul 22, 2014 10:07 pm

You better marry in your EU home country, live there for a while and *then* move to Finland. That is "EU free movement" and theres very little restrictions. Otherwise you get "treated like a Finn" and worse "alien finlander" so unless she has a permanent residence (without end date) in Finland, your country first & marry there.

Bluemoons · Post by **Bluemoons** » Tue Jul 22, 2014 10:11 pm

First of all thanks for you reply.

I had already checked that site but was looking for a more "hands on experience" (I guess your nickname suggests this)

As for the amount saved, atm, it's well more than 3000 euros which I am sure is not enough and will work towards increasing that amount.

Now my Finnish skills are non existent atm, I do plan on taking a course once we are there. The only thing I have going for me is the accent, I can pronounce Finnish decently. My experience is mainly in the IT field (10+ years)

As for her, hopefully she can enroll in an university and continue her studies. She'll take English courses.

I do want to marry her, not only because I love her but to secure her stay with me.

I am well aware of how hard it can be to get a job, but there's exceptions in my industry (a north american friend just got hired by a Finnish company and is moving there in a few months) so I'm hoping for such luck too. It would be an improvement of our current situation.

Cheers!

Bluemoons · Post by **Bluemoons** » Tue Jul 22, 2014 10:11 pm

Pursuivant wrote:You better marry in your EU home country, live there for a while and *then* move to Finland. That is "EU free movement" and theres very little restrictions. Otherwise you get "treated like a Finn" and worse "alien finlander" so unless she has a permanent residence (without end date) in Finland, your country first & marry there.

Hey there. We do not reside currently within the EU.

GermanInHelsinki · Post by **GermanInHelsinki** » Wed Jul 23, 2014 12:52 am

It depends of course on where in Finland you will move, what your area of expertise is, and how good you are in that area.

If you are world-class in a field that is relevant for Rovio/Supercell/Intel/Samsung/... and move to Helsinki, you will of course have decent job opportunities.

If you are only average and move to Oulu, you will of course meet thousands of other people with 10+ years experience in the IT field while queueing in the bread line.

Bluemoons · Post by **Bluemoons** » Wed Jul 23, 2014 4:00 am

Also I failed to mention I have a couple friends there, one works for F Secure, and another for Samsung.

I might not be world class, but I can surely work!

Thanks for all of the replies.

(and yes he is VERY lucky but he did work a lot to get the job)

Bluemoons · Post by **Bluemoons** » Wed Jul 23, 2014 6:15 am

tummansininen wrote:Funny you should mention F-Secure, my husband deals with the F-Secure people a lot, doing server admin and security stuff for a multinational which serves lots of the bigger companies in Finland. For him it requires Finnish because one of their contracts is in the public sector, and official languages are a legal thing. Definitely most larger companies don't have that requirement. So yes, they end up with contracts delivered using only English, more and more. Irony is that hubby almost lost his job last year after 11 years with them, as they sent most of the jobs to Tallinn, paying about 1800 euro per month less than in Finland. Those server admins are now serving all the (Finnish) clients in English. The jobs in English are out there. Or rather a lot of them are "over" there. Or moving to India.

I didn't ask if you can work Many of us "can" work. "Can find a job" is a different question and yeah... gotta be world-class and/or the company has to be desperate before they will hire someone without Finnish skills, particularly if the candidate is not EU like your friend, or not yet living here like you. Since you confidently skirted the thing about having a very rare skillset, I gather you have it, plus a master's too. I hope you have a plan B to work for yourself, since you obviously have the capabilities. Because it seems to be the main way that skilled immigrants manage to survive in Finland without a job offer in advance. Good luck in the job search

Hey there! Thanks! I do run my own company here, and am employed at a multinational. So I have decent work experience but as you put it, getting a job i a diff thing. My friends are finns who work for those companies, I did fail to mention that before. And English is not my mother tongue, so I guess (same goes with my soon to me wife) we will have a decent task ahead, learning the languange.

Again thanks for all the replies.

Pursuivant · Post by **Pursuivant** » Wed Jul 23, 2014 11:48 am

I moved to UK AS
1) there are IT jobs
2) you get more with your money
3) when you open the garage door there isnt a meter of snow

GermanInHelsinki · Post by **GermanInHelsinki** » Wed Jul 23, 2014 1:18 pm

You should of course try to secure a job before you move to Finland. If you fail to get a job when applying in the 6 months before your planned move, it is of course likely that you will not find a job in the 6 months after your move.

GermanInHelsinki · Post by **GermanInHelsinki** » Wed Jul 23, 2014 1:22 pm

Bluemoons · Post by **Bluemoons** » Wed Jul 23, 2014 2:59 pm

If I had to consider another country, it wouldn't be UK. Maybe Ireland.

Of course in the ideal world i'd try to secure a job before hand but as that isn't always possible.

But I'll try.

Thanks!

GermanInHelsinki · Post by **GermanInHelsinki** » Thu Jul 24, 2014 12:02 am

As EU citizen you can of course come to Finland for 3 months without registering anywhere. And your girlfriend might be able to get a 90 days Schengen visa.

With the tiny amount of money you have, you can of course not register on the basis of sufficient means of support.

A student residence permit for your girlfriend of course requires that she has 6720 Euro in her own bank account.

You should of course have a good Plan B for the likely case that you will not find a job in Finland within 3 months.

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