Moving Overseas with kids – Considerations & Top Tips

People and families consider moving abroad or immigrating for various reasons and some of the more common reasons are;

• to get a better job
• have a bigger house and land/garden
• provide a better education and environment for your kids
• have a better work/life balance

Perhaps its for all of the above reasons and that’s fine too! Whatever your reason is – it needs to be applicable to YOU…not your neighbour or your best friend as everyone’s situation is different and yes I’m going to say it – try not to judge why no-one else is immigrating too! It’s a huge step moving house let alone moving country and maybe even continent and made even more complicated (sometimes) when children are involved.

So if I could give just one piece of advice to those considering a complete life overhaul then it would be this:

“Whatever your WHY for moving is – keep that WHY close to your heart and don’t lose sight of your reason and your goal”

We made the decision a long time ago for some of the above reasons and many more and we have been questioned many times over them by people from home and abroad. Many of those times we have come across bewildered looks and raised eyebrows and the inevitable question of “But what about your family?! They must be devastated!” and that can be a difficult question for some but I promise over time you realise the bewildered looks are just fear of the unknown, the raised eyebrows are probably a mix of curiosity and jealously and the question on family is there to throw doubt on your WHY – which is why I say it must be important to You.

Now our main WHY hasn’t changed but some of our plans around how we achieve it with our move have evolved since our initial decision made years ago – that’s normal, goalposts sometimes move but your main WHY for moving should still remain.

Things to Consider & Tips for Moving Abroad with Kids

• What age will the child/ren be when you plan to move/immigrate – can you move prior to them starting school or in between a natural break i.e. between finishing primary and starting secondary schools. Remember these may be different abroad so do your homework on the local education system.
• Vaccinations & health check ups – you may not get the some vaccinations in the country you are immigrating to so worth checking if you want your child/ren to have their BCG etc. before you leave.
• Missing friends and family is inevitable but having a time and day that you call them on and keeping this consistent will help with setting a routine for you and the kids. It will also make people at home know that you are considering them too.
• The change of routine and setting can be difficult enough for us adults and even more daunting for kids hitting that emotional and physical roller-coaster of puberty or little ones still getting to grips with their mother tongue only to then have a new language and culture to compute! If you can plan to maintain some key routines like mealtimes and bedtime this can help as well as packing something familiar like that favourite teddy or book.

Once you have made the decision

For us it became much easier to compute and almost a relief when we picked a date as then we finally had a countdown to start planning things against. Here are our top tips to planning the move:

1. Pick a date and try your best to stick to it! Easiest way is to just book your flights!
2. Start thinking about what you want to take with you – will you be taking everything but the kitchen sink or selling everything and backpacking? If its the former then start collating your itinerary and get at least 3 shipping quotes. If its the latter (go you by the way) then go hell for leather and sell, sell, sell!!
3. Visa’s/work permits/residence permits – check the local government websites for information and send your applications asap, as although you may not need one, your kids and husband might (this was our scenario)
4. Tell your loved ones so they do not feel like they are being kept in the dark and keep bringing it up as it gets closer (some people will want to ignore the fact you are leaving and pretend it’s not happening so talking about it regularly will often help)
5. Close unnecessary services/bank accounts and check your bank accounts for fees when spending abroad (some credit cards don’t charge fees for overseas spending)

So I hope that has given you or someone you know some food for thought when considering moving abroad/immigrating with children – we know its a big decision but if it’s right for you then it will be epic!