Would you believe that you can move to almost any country in the EU, or in fact in the entire world? There are a few exceptions like the USA, but only because it requires a sum of money which, let’s be honest, freelancers don’t usually make.

Almost every country in the world is happy to welcome people who earn enough to support themselves - people who don't require help from the government, pay their taxes and social contributions, and cover all of their living costs. On top of this, in case a person can create and secure several full-time jobs, it is considered to be a massive bonus. However, paying your taxes is also good enough.

The general idea is that you must prove that you can financially afford to support yourself. Once it's done, you can legally live almost everywhere in the world, for as long as you would like to.

How can you prove it? The best and the easiest way is:

• You have a few years of experience working as a sole trader or an entrepreneur. You need to provide a certificate that you’ve been registered as a sole trader for the last couple of years, or prove that you own a company.
• You make enough money. Enough is at least +30% of an average income at the city you’d like to relocate to. The more the merrier! Your bank statements would provide sufficient proof of income.
• You have an educational diploma or a portfolio, or anything else which could be used to prove that you're good at what you’re doing. You can include patents, public speeches, exhibitions, work-related articles, certificates, etc.
• You have enough savings to cover your living costs and support youself for at least a year.
• You should explain how you plan to find new customers and show that you can secure the existing ones.
• You should find potential clients who could write and sign a formal letter of interest. Ideally, this will include that you're a well known professional in your industry, and that they may use your services should you relocate to a given country.
• You should provide a local certificate of good conduct. It has to say that you haven't been involved in crime and haven't gone bankrupt in the countries you've been a residence for the last 5-10 years.

In case you can provide all of the above, you can easily get a residence permit almost anywhere in the world. Each missing requirement decreases your chances. As I mentioned in my first blog, I don't have a formal degree so don't let it discourage you.

Once you have the documents on your hands, you should go to the Consulate of a chosen country and apply for an Entrepreneur visa. Some countries would allow you to switch status from a tourist visa but the majority won't.

What should you submit? Everything. You can call it a business plan. When you apply as a company owner, it’s best to attach proof that you already have a registered company. Your chances would come close to 100% if you have or could transfer existing clients to your new business.

Some countries (Poland, for example) require last year’s report to show that the company has enough money on the account to pay you a salary.

Moving on, the Consulate doesn’t make decisions on such applications and it should ask an Immigration Office to confirm it could issue a visa.

Immigration Office is interested in two things:

• enough money to support yourself without any help from the Government.
• stability of your business in the next several years.

The second requirement is out of scope for an Immigration Office and it sends a copy of your documents to the Chamber of Commerce (or a local equivalent). The Chamber of Commerce responds with their opinion on your potential performance and feasibility of running your business in the city of your choice, based on your experience, funding, etc. Let’s look at specific situations when you may be rejected or approved. I’ll give you a few examples.

You will be rejected if you'd like to open a bar in Berlin, Germany, but have €20,000 in savings as share capital, haven't got an experience of running a bar, plus you’ve never been self-employed prior to your application.

You will be approved if you’re a full-stack software engineer, selling your services to several long-term clients through your own company. On top of it, you have additional jobs through freelance marketplaces and chose Berlin because of its concentration of IT professionals. This, of course, will help you acquire new contacts and attract even more clients.

I’m sure you get an idea.

Keep in mind that if you create a business plan with an estimated turnover of €500,000 per year and a profit of €400,000, you will most definitely get a visa. However, if you don’t achieve it in the next few years, it’s bad news — you can't extend your stay.

Don’t put anything down just to qualify for your visa. Always remember that it’s also a commitment that you’ve made to extend your status. In case you weren't successful or at least didn't come close enough, you will have a lot of trouble extending your stay.

You can use our simple calculator to estimate your taxes and living costs, so you know what budget you should be aiming for at most European destinations. Leave your details in the Help me move window to apply for our help with your relocation.

Compared to personal income, paying taxes as a freelancer could be very attractive. Why? You’ve opened the door to pay less, thanks to all the various schemes available. With a bit of careful planning, depending on how you sell your services, this could be very easy. It might also get very complicated.

To start with, you have several ways to pay yourself: dividends, salary, dividends and salary, or register as a sole-trader. Simplified, this could be described as:

• You sell your services under your name
• You set up a company which sells your services

Usually, taxes are paid from your profit, not turnover. You should track all the expenses to calculate what you’ve spent and how much you’ve earned during the year. Then you calculate your profit so you can pay taxes. You can also refund yourself in case you prepaid taxes from an estimated profit but the year hasn’t gone as well as you planned.

So which expenses are work related? This is an interesting topic. To keep it simple, everything that is required for work. Examples? In case you need a computer, it is definitely a work-related expense. Tea and coffee? Usually, it is. Espresso machine? It depends on but usually it could be. As well as a coffee cup! Don’t forget to include that part of your home which you use as an office, or what you’ve spent for a co-working space. Conferences and travel expenses to visit your clients? Definitely. A lot of expenditures may be considered work-related and each country has its own rules on what is acceptable to deduct.

General logic is simple: know your limits and don't try to deduct each diner with your wife. Can you buy a car? Yes, you can, but it shouldn't be a convertible or a roadster. In case you buy a regular car it should be fine, with a few exceptions. When you don’t have an office and you work from home, plus you haven't made any business trips to nearby cities, tax office may not accept your car as an expense. You should understand that there’s a fine line between acceptable and unacceptable.

Also, once you buy something you should keep it on your account as "active". Why? Because your new laptop has some value which will depreciate in time. Every country has a different limit for items that may depreciate after selling. In some places it is up to €100, in others it’s up to €1'000. Usually, you should keep it on your account for a few years, which is also country specific - on average between 3 to 5 years. How do you depreciate your stuff? This is also country specific. In some places, you deduct by a calendar year, in others by a month. Generally, the rules are simple and easy to follow.

So, you should track:

• Earnings;
• Expenses (tagged and categorised);
• Expensive work-related items that depreciate in value each month or year.

Let’s say, each month you earn an income, I. You’ve spent some of it on coffees and other small expenditures, of which you could deduct the whole value as E. Also, you have some expensive items on your account that you’re tracking. For example, a laptop for €1'800 that you can depreciate to zero in value in 3 year — each month it will lose in value €1'800/36 = €50.

So, the profit this month is: P = I - E - €50.

Can it be negative? Yes it can. Can an annual profit be negative? Yes it can. Will your tax office pay you back any taxes from a negative profit? No, but if you prepaid taxes for an expected profit that was over your actual profit, the tax office will return an overpaid amount. And you can move negative profit to next year with some country specified rules.

As you can see, it’s not rocket science if you follow the guidelines. We will help you with it. Just track all your earnings and outgoings, upload invoices and we’ll take care of the value, depreciation, calculate profit and taxes, which should be paid or refunded.

When you sell your services as a sole-trader, the money is yours, everything you buy belongs to you, and in theory it should be pretty simple — but in real life, it isn't. To start with, you're using your bank account not just for work-related spending but also for your personal outgoings. You should keep all your records in good order throughout the year because otherwise, it is close to impossible to track and categorise these entries. How many transactions are on your card? Several each day, which makes it a thousand each year.

As a simple solution, you can split your personal money and work-related money by using separate cards or separate bank accounts. This is another reason we offer you our bank card. Just use it for everything work related. Use it to be paid by your clients. We will track every transaction for you, and all what is left for you to do is upload an invoice or a bill to each transaction, together with a small note.

Moving on, this won’t help you determine your tax residence — this was explained in the logic behind personal income tax. Also, this won’t help you determine in which country and how much you should pay when you move from one country to another, during one financial year.

So, selling the services under your name is looking like a simpler option. That is, if you live in one country, don't move from one country to another during one year, and haven't worked in other countries where you aren’t a tax resident — then it should be simple. Also, don’t forget to use a separate bank account for work. Otherwise, this will turn into a nightmare.

What are the alternatives? Use a one-man-business. A company is a completely different legal entity.  A company will need a bank account. It may own your laptop. Together with your coffee cups.

And when you're selling your services under the company name the line between your personal money and work-related money or things is very bold. Who owns it? You or company? If this is is work-related things — the company owns it.

With this arrangement, it’s best to keep your personal taxes as simple as possible. You might pay yourself:

• A salary each month.
• Dividends once a year.

Company taxes aren’t complicated because your spending won't mix with any random transactions, like getting a glass of wine at your local bar. In case you work as an IT freelancer and have a few clients that wire all payments to your account, you won’t have any cash which also keeps your accounting simple.

Which set up brings you more benefits? Usually, the company-based setup has a lower effective tax rate, with a few exceptions in EU - Germany and Denmark, as an example. It’s also best forliability control. In case your company has debt, you account for the company's liability to the limit of unpaid share capital. Yes, the company will account for all that goes wrong, but the company’s value only equates to what the company owns, plus the funds on its bank account. You won’t have a court decision made personally against you, ordering you to pay a few hundredthousand dollars because your company is fined for NDA violations.

What do I prefer? A company based setup. It’s very straight-forward and has better liability control. This is only a suggestion and, of course, the decision is yours.

Practically, you can move when your documents are ready, but it’s best to prepare in advance to avoid double taxation. A little bit of planning can save you a great deal of headache, or at least some money which is never a bad thing.

What should you do?

1. Read a double taxation agreement between a country where you currently live and the country you relocate to, to check the conditions of tax residence. Usually, it is over 183 day a year.
2. Move only when you secure your tax residency - at the end of August, September or October, depending on how much you’ve traveled in the current year and how many days you have spent outside of the country of your current residence. Another good time to move is the beginning of the year. January sounds good, doesn't it?
3. Withdraw all you have to pay yourself before you enter the new country. It’s best to liquidate an old company as soon as you can. This will allow you to pay out second-time dividends, which is by far the easiest option.
4. Do not pay yourself from a new company and from a new country during the year when you're a tax resident of your previous country. In case you’re moving in the beginning of the year, pay all you have to before the last year has ended.

As you can see, you may use two different strategies to avoid most of the headache:

1. Stop paying yourself a salary in June to July. Liquidate the company, and pay out dividends in August to September. Move to a new country when your tax residence is secured and all company funds are withdrawn - September to October, but in some cases it may also be August or November. Start paying a salary from a new company from 1st January. You will have a few months to get all the paperworks in order.
2. Stop paying yourself a salary in September to October. Liquidate the company and pay out dividends up to the middle of December. November would be perfect to be on the safer side. Move to a new home in January - February, and start paying a salary from the new company as soon as you would like to.

A few notes:

• After liquidation and paying the final dividends, a company may still formally exist and you may still account for liability. This will depend on the local laws and regulations.
• The first option will save you time, but will require showing your income from the current country of residence to the tax office of your destination. You won't pay taxes at the new place, but you should still send all tax-related forms and proof that your tax payments are up to date, and how much you’ve been paying.
• The second option will require more cash because once you move, your new company may not have enough funds to pay a salary. Also, you run a risk of delays, which could mean that if you pay dividends in January, you would have to pay taxes in both countries.

What did I go for? I'm planning to move to my next country around August, or at least have all the documents ready by then. Occasionally it takes longer than I expected but still in the calendar's year.

And filling in just one extra form it isn't a big deal compared to waiting for months until he calendar's year is finished.

Taxes. Everyone pays them, everyone tries to pay less of them. I will try to explain the logic behind personal income tax, as well as how and where you should pay them.

Let’s start with a simple case, you live in one specific country for over a year where you earn a salary. In this case everything is simple and usually you don’t need to fill in any tax related forms. The company holds some part of your salary each month and you receive a payslip which tells you how much taxes you paid.

How about dividends? Most of the time it’s the same principal, as long as you live in the same country where your company is registered and operates.

Now let’s look at the more complex models you might come across.

Taxes must be paid almost everywhere with a few exceptions, but generally the world is moving towards taxes in every country.

So, who is claiming taxes on personal income?

1. A country of origin of income.
2. A country(-ies) where you are a tax resident.
3. A country (-ies) where you are (or were) a citizen or had a long-term residence status.

The country of origin of income is pretty straight forward. As an example, when you sell a house in Germany, Germany is your country of origin of income. In case you receive a salary from an Italian company, Italy is your country of origin of income. Say, you register as a sole-trader in France and sell your services worldwide - France would be your country of origin of income.

Tax residency. As a guideline, you should live in the country for over 183 days a year. Occasionally it’s also a requirement to be registered somewhere.

There are a few exceptions. Some examples:

• If you have only one home (owned or rented) and it is in the UK, plus you’ve spent at least 91 days and at least 30 days in this particular year at this home, you are a UK tax resident. There are several exceptions, for example if you have a full-time job elsewhere.
• If you’re registered in Germany, you are a tax resident in Germany.

When you’re just visiting a country for a few weeks, nobody cares about your tax situation. However, if you spend a couple of months in one country, and it happens that it’s the longest period you’ve spent somewhere during this particular year.. This could be a different, complicated story.

At this point you can look at the regular duration limit of a tourist visa from a different perspective - 90 days in 180 days, or under 6 months in 1 year. It’s your protection from tax residency in a country you visit as a tourist.

Some countries may expect you to fill in the form and pay taxes even if you don't live there. Examples? USA. IRS has rules for taxation of Nonresident Aliens. The good news, it has huge credits (over $100k per year) and reductions (rental expenses outside of USA) that keeps taxes at zero for pretty much everyone.

As I mentioned, when you permanently live in the country of origin of your income everything is straight forward.

So what happens if you live between two countries, or have a well paid, full-time job in a country where you don’t live? Or maybe you run a company which pays you dividends, but you’re also a citizen of a different country? Well, it is possible that you should be paying taxes in each country, and if you are very unlucky, your taxes might be higher than your income. Yep, it happens.

Sometimes the place where you have the strongest connections is called a centre of vital interests. What kind of connections? It could be you permanent home, family, kids attending a local school, etc. In case you live between a few countries, it is possible that you may have more than one of these centres. It is also possible to have none.

You may use the centre of vital interests as a way to determine your tax residency. Tax office may use it too as a reason to why you should pay your taxes to them.

It’s not as bad as it seems though. Have you ever heard of double taxation treaties? It’s an agreement between two countries to prevent both the double taxation and sometimes the double non-taxation.

This agreement determines how and where your taxes should be paid when you live in country A and your origin of income is country B. In circumstances when an agreement doesn't exist between the two, you should pay at A and B. In case there is an agreement, it usually allows credit paid taxes in the country of origin of income, or at least their part in taxes which you should pay in the country of your residence.

Not all countries in the world have an agreement with each other. When it does exist, it’s a unique text in an unexpected language. Usually, it is English or an official language of the country if they use the same one. Not always though. An agreement about double taxation between Georgia and Germany. Each country has a national and official language but an agreement is in a third language. Nope, it isn't English. It is Russian. Why? I have no idea.

Moving forward. Social contributions.

Almost every country expects a company to pay social contributions based on a salary - health insurance, pension, etc.

When a person lives in one country — Germany, for example — and works full time as an employee in another country — the USA, for example, it is possible that his company (or him) should pay all social contributions to the country where he is resident.

The line between this should and shouldn't is pretty thin. When a person sells his services as a sole-trader, the company shouldn't pay it. If a person isn't a sole-trader, it’s bad new, I’m afraid.

The last interesting question, if you register as a sole-trader in one country, and sell your services as a sole-trader living in a different country - where should you pay taxes? Are you violating the law of your home if you sell services when you aren't registered as a sole-trader in your country of residence?

Double taxation agreement doesn't have an answer to that question. They explain in every detail everything related to salaries, royalty, pensions, dividends, how to determine your company's centre of operation and other topics such as income as a rentier... but they haven't touched this topic.

...and somewhere here I feel that you might understand why I'm moving from one country to another and work as a one-man-business. This keeps my taxes as simple to manage as possible. It may be a bit more expensive, but it allows me to keep distances which make relocation much easier and less stressful.

As a freelancer you have to make a choice on how to sell your services, which consequently determines your tax liability. I’m fully aware in some countries and in certain circumstances you can get away with paying no taxes but it is illegal pretty much everywhere, so we won’t be covering this.

Legally, you should choose between these two options:

• Sole trader. You're running your business as an individual person.
• Private limited company. You are an owner and a managing director of the company that sells your service.

These options differ in a number of ways:

• Name on an invoice— when you are a sole-trader, the name is yours. When you run everything through a company, a company is an entity that receives the money.
• Responsibility — sole-trader is equivalent to you as a person. In circumstances  when something goes wrong and clients go to court - say, NDA was compromised and you’re asked to pay out a huge sum... Well, this is your personal debt. When you use a company, the company as a legal entity accounts for it. And you as an owner have responsibility limited for amount of unpaid share capital.
• Money ownership — when you're a sole-trader, the money is yours. You may use your personal bank account to keep it (and gain a lot of pain with accounting), but you could use the funds as soon as you want to. When using a company, before you pay for that glass of wine, you should withdraw it - by paying yourself a salary or dividends.

What is the best option? It depends on. I personally use a company because I prefer better lability control.

Also, not every country has an option to register as a sole-trader and authorities may suggest that you register as a one-euro-company instead. Furthermore, some countries won’t allow you to register as a sole-trader if you aren't already their resident. Sometimes to receive this status you’re required to sign a long-term rental contract. While other countries have a special visa for sole-traders which you should receive before you enter the country - some will allow you to change your status, but others will not..

Let’s simplify this to a question: what is the cheaper option in your next country?

Sole-trading is pretty clear - this is your personal money, you own it and you pay taxes on it. In case you operate through a company, there are three options to withdraw the money:

• Dividends. A single payment made annually out of accumulated profits.
• Salary. A fixed monthly income you pay yourself to cover your living expenses.
• Salary + Dividends. A combination of a fixed monthly income with a bonus at the end of the year.

Do tax rates differ for these options? Absolutely! Besides, some of the countries require a minimum salary for each employee, others only for a managing director.

When your company pays you a salary, it should:

• deduct personal income taxes
• deduct social contributions
• pay additional social contributions

Sounds like a sole-trader must be a cheaper option? I’m afraid not. Usually you must pay the same amount of social contributions as the company. Plus a little extra if you didn’t earn enough to pay a salary, which could be an issue.

As a general rule, the cheapest option are dividends, and sole-trader comes close to paying a salary. However, some countries we currently support have a few exceptions:

• Austria. Taxes on dividends are lower. Sole-trader rate is 3%-5%, and there is a reduction for income below €3'000 per month.
• Belgium. Each company should pay a minimum of €45'000 per annum as a salary to a managing director, or at least use this amount as a threshold for social contributions and taxes. This makes company-based setup impossible for turnover below €4'000 per month. Salary is the most expensive option (up to 70%!), and a sole-trader is the cheapest for income of up to €7'000 per month. Above that dividends may save you around 5%.
• Bulgaria. There is no difference for income above €6'000 per month. Below €6'000 dividends are the cheaper option.
• Czech Republic. Sole trader is cheaper than salary by 10-15%, and matches dividends at €9'500 per month. For anything above a sole-trader would be a better option.
• Cyprus. Dividends are the most expensive option for income of up to €4'500 per month. For anything above the difference is close to 5%.
• Denmark. Dividens are more expensive than both salary and sole-trading. However, for income over €2'700 per month dividends match a salary, and for over €3'000 per month the difference between sole-trading and a salary is close to nothing.
• France. Sole-trader is the cheaper option which saves you 15% or more.
• Germany. Dividends are the most expensive option, by far.
• Georgia. Sole-trader pays just 1% in taxes for income of up to €12'000 per month.
• Hungary. Sole-trader will save you around 12%. Dividends and salary have a similar tax rate.
• Ireland. Sole-trader is a cheaper option for income of up to €9'000 per month. For anything above dividends are your best option.
• Latvia. You will pay lower taxes if you register a microenterprise. For turnover below €50’000 per annum you don’t have to pay social contributions.
• Macedonia. For income of up to €2'500 per month, sole-trader rates are similar to a salary. Above this, the tax rates are lower, and above €8'500 per month the rates are similar to dividends. So the more you earn, the lower your tax rate is. Salary is a better option if you earn anything above €17'000 per month.
• Montenegro. Dividends are cheaper for an amount below €5'500 per month. For anything above a sole-trader status may save you up to 5%. Paying a salary will cost you +20%, however for anything above €15'000 per month the taxes will match of those on dividends.
• The Netherlands. Salary is the most expensive option for lower income. For income over €5'500 per month, taxes match those of a sole-trader. Above €6'500-€7'000 per month taxes come close to those of dividends.
• Norway. All three options are very similar in cost, varying by ±3%.  However, taking into account that a minimal threshhold for social contribution is huge, salary might turn out much more expensive.
• Portugal. Sole trader status is similar to dividends, or cheaper if your income is below €100'000 per annum when special tax regime is applied.
• Serbia. Dividends are the cheapest option for income of up to €6'500 per month. For anything above, sole-trading or a salary will cost you less.
• Switzerland. Dividends are the most expensive option. Sole-trader is much cheaper, with a huge difference of 25%-30%.
• UK. Dividends and sole-trading are somewhat similar, while salary will be more expensive to pay.
• Turkey. All three options come very close for income above €6'000 per month. Above €12'000 per month there is practically no difference.

Overall, a company is your best bet for liability control. You could use a salary to cash flow your living costs, and pay yourseld a bonus at the end of the year. Usually this would help you keep your salary related taxes as low as possible. However, this is not always the case and will depend on the chosen country and your income. Use the calculator here to estimate taxes you would pay for your income, in a country of your choice.

Here are a few interesting facts about taxes that I’ve discovered while creating the tax models for over 30 countries, which are used on our website.

Tax models differ significantly from one country to another. There could be several levels of taxation, different regions of the country could have different tax models, and sometimes there is a unique logic behind it. Some are just plain unusual. Examples?

• Andorra - an income tax was introduced in 2015. Yep, just a few years ago. Until then it was a European tax haven.
• Vienna, Austria - companies pay a fixed fee to the public transport authority to keep the annual ticket prices low - as low as €1 per day.
• Belgium - a communal tax system. Communas are very small - Brussels have 19 of them and each one pays a different percentage, varying between 0% to 9%.
• Belgium - there is a special surcharge that is called crisis surtax to fund the backwash of 2008 crisis.
• Belgium - there is a special surcharge called secret commissions. It’s applied when the beneficiary is not properly identified.
• Czech Republic - extra 7% tax for people who earn more than average - over 130,000 Kč per month.
• Denmark — special 8% tax to support the labour market.
• Finland — residents use 75% of income from dividends as a base for income tax.
• Finland — a self-employed person can choose the amount to declare for pension contributions.
• French — special 3% tax for a person with income over €250,000 per year.
• French — there are social contributions on dividends.
• Georgia — has a special tax regime for IT companies and entrepreneurs which helps reduce taxes to 1%-5%.
• Germany — there is a unique formula to calculate the tax percentage.
• Germany — solidarity surcharge for the reunion of the country at 5.5% of paid taxes.
• Greece — solidarity contribution for people with income over a certain level. It has several levels from 2.2% to up to €20k/year; and 10% for over €220k/year.
• Italy — different regions have different taxes. It may be a flat rate, fixed or tax brackets.
• Latvia — has a special tax regime for small companies which makes taxes extremely simple to read.
• Luxembourg — has 22 tax brackets. I guess it’s a world record.
• Netherlands — special tax regime for higher paid employees which reduces tax base by 30%.
• Portugal — special reduced tax regime for sole-traders who make up to €200k per year. This allows you to pay taxes on only 75% of your income.
• Spain — each employer should pay 0,6% of income with some limits to occupational training.
• Switzerland — each canton has a completely different tax model. How big is the difference? Between Geneva and Zürich the difference is similar to the difference between Germany and France.

This isn't a complete list. I've missed a lot of information that doesn’t relate to freelancers, like a special tax regime for non-habitual residents of Portugal.

Let’s start with a story of my relocation journey.

A few years ago I’ve realised that I’m tired of Tbilisi, Georgia, where I’ve spent the last couple of years - it was time to move.

I had an idea in mind that I want to live somewhere in the EU, preferably somewhere I haven't lived before. My freelance income was sufficient to support me and my wife in most EU countries.

We made a list of a few cities, most were Northern European destinations in well developed countries:

• Paris, France
• Berlin, Germany
• Vienna, Austria
• Edinburgh, United Kingdom
• Gdansk, Poland

After creating a list of potential counties, it was time to estimate what changes are awaiting once I relocate. Cost of living, different tax systems, mandatory social contributions - I took it all into account.

The only constant was my expected personal income. So I’ve started creating models to help me estimate how much spare money could be leftover each month. The money to spend on a new dress for my beautiful wife, good wine or a brand new phone.

I’ve called this money ‘free-cash’. Cash that I don't have any plans for and can enjoy!

The model turned out very complex and went through several phases. The initial one was just an excel table - a complicated, messy one. The second one was a Scala application. The third one, well.. It’s our current website.

I've relocated a numerous amount of times throughout my life. At some point, it became evident that all freelancers who want to move share the same pain:

• You don’t know how much taxes and social contributions you'd have to pay. You can google it but there isn’t an easy to use model, just some unstructured facts and difficult to read information.
• You don’t know anyone who will keep your taxes in order. You would need someone filling in the forms if you don’t speak the language.
• Banking. Opening a bank account is tricky. In fact, very tricky when you just arrived and haven’t got any proof of residence. To obtain proof of residence, you need to rent a flat, which requires a bank account. Catch 22, anyone?
• Invoicing, local VAT. These have a potential to cause a lot of headache. Some countries, for example, offer mandatory e-invoicing solutions that aren’t easy to use and don’t have an English interface.
• Obtaining status in the country. Visa, residence permit, partner support. Evidence, documents - counting by the hundreds.

… and many other tasks I had to solve numerous amout of times, all from scratch. It wasn’t rocket science, but it had to be done and these weren’t the most exciting tasks out there, to put it nicely.

Around this time I’ve realised that I can use my future relocation as a test case. I can prove to you that as a freelancer, it is possible to move almost anywhere.

Which country did I choose? Berlin, Germany. Here are a a few reasons for it:

• Good ratio of free-cash applicable to my income.
• Moving to Germany without a formal degree, as a freelancer, sounds like a good challenge.

To make it an even better test case, I went through a complex route:

• I’m moving as an owner of a company that I use for my freelance work.
• I set a very limited budget - my company pays me a salary of €2,500 per month.
• I have a wife. She doesn’t work and is financially dependent on me.
• I don’t speak a word of German.

I set a preliminary deadline at around a year.

The first step I took was at the end of April - registered a company and found a virtual office.

It wasn’t a big deal and at the end of May the company was in the register. In June I went on to open a bank account for the company, which also took quite a bit of time.

At the end of June I filed for a VAT registration form, to receive a final VAT ID in November.

Around the same time I’ve started putting some documents together to present to a consulate:

• A business plan showing how great I am, how complex my work is and that I have no trouble supporting myself financially. Also, I wanted to show that if all goes according to plan, in a couple of years I'll be in a position to hire a few employees.
• Proof of a company registration.
• Proof that I've ran a company before - registration documents for my Georgian company with a Tax Office letter that it hasn’t run into debt.
• A bank statement showing sufficient funds of around a year's worth of salary.
• A draft of the contract to hire myself.
• Personal references from friends stating that they know me well, I'm an expert in the industry and what I do is pretty cool. Also, it’s useful to say they would use your services in Germany if you were to move (Alexei, Matthew - thanks!).
• A cover letter addressed to the Consul, explaining why I'd love to move to Berlin from Tbilisi.
• Other necessities such as an application form, marriage certificate, photos etc.

The hardest part? You won’t believe it. It’s pretty tough to prepare the documents, but the hardest part was to get an appointment at the consulate. I have no idea why. I would imagine a German consulate in Tbilisi is popular and has fewer slots, but it’s only a guess. I’ve tried to book an appointment right now, and.. nope, still no slots!

I’ve started checking the website at 0:00 Berlin time and finally made two appointments, for me and my wife.

We applied for the visa in the middle of July.

At the end of October I got the news that my application was successful and the Consulate in Tbilisi issued a visa.

Around the same time I’ve started converting my excel model into a website you’re using right now.

In the meantime, I only had a visa, not a residence permit, so let me finish the story.

The next day we moved, I visited Bürgeramt to register, and in a few weeks my personal Tax ID has arrived. Now I could hire myself and start paying a salary from 1st December.

In November, a few days after registration, I’ve made an appointment to Ausländerbehörde to get a residence permit. It happened that my appointment was scheduled one day after my visa expired.

Nothing complicated, just filled in a form and prepared some more documents:

• Proof of registration in Berlin
• Contract with my company
• Contract with our rented apartment
• Health insurance card

I had more than enough time to buy insurance, sign a long-term lease and generally organise my life, so none of it was an issue.

In the middle of February I’ve received a residence permit for 3 years.

How long did it take?

From the start of document preparation to getting a residence permit - around 10 months. Could I have done it faster? Going for a sole trader status would have saved me a couple of months, but don’t expect anything less than 6 months overall.

I've also not included most of the pain I went through during this year. Just a few examples:

• An official document from the Georgian government which should have confirmed my full address didn’t include a postcode. No one cares for postcodes in Georgia. They do in Germany though. Statements from the Bank of Georgia also don’t include a postcode. My last shot was to check the Georgian Post website and attach a screenshot to my documents. However, it didn’t have any streets which start with a ‘C’. They missed them in the English version of their website. Seriously, you can check it by yourself here. Look for Chavchavadze Avenue. You won’t find it. Then, use Google Maps to check the scale of this street and how prominent it is.
• I’ve had to translate a lot of documents from Georgian and Russian to German, which wasn't easy.
• My marriage certificate didn’t have an apostille, and it was difficult to obtain one remotely.
• German Tax Office rejected my first application for VAT ID because they didn’t understand why I would need to pay VAT living in Georgia. My company only received it after an official complaint I made to another Tax Office.
• After a couple of months, VAT Tax Office sent me a mail (not email, snail mail!)  that they moved my company VAT to a different Tax Office where I paid my other taxes. However, after another few weeks I received yet another letter that they’ve made an error and would like to issue a new EU VAT ID. At this point, more than six months have passed since the last VAT ID was issued but when I check the VIES VAT database, the information still hasn’t been updated.
• I have filled in a lot of forms in German, which I don’t speak.
• Many other things I most definitely forgot to mention.