Hi to everyone

I have loved reading through the different posts and must say the evidence shows there is not a sane one among you. Having said that you all seem like a great bunch of people.

I am moving out to Spain in a couple of months with my 12 yr old daughter. At the moment we dont know what part of Spain to choose. Hoping if I could throw some questions at you it will help us decide. Doing a scout around in a couple of weeks.

12 yr old daughter with very basic Spanish and I cant afford an International School. Has anyone had experience of introducing a child of this age and ability into a state school or know where I can fint internet schooling from?

What would be the chance of me renting a place for 6 to 12 months with 2 x small dogs would anyone know where to look? All I can find are holiday rentals.

Any ideas what the work prospects for a hypnotherapist would be in Spain? I dont do stage work. Clynical, past life and NLP fast phobia work, weight loss etc.

As you can see I dont go in for planning!! We have been talking about moving for 5 years & we have got bored of talking and are just going to do it. Thank you all

Hello Suzanne, and welcome to the forum

I can't help at all with the schooling or hypnotherapy questions, I'm afraid.

We rented a house with one large GSD, without any problems.
We found that asking in places like local bars and the churreria, was about the most useful place to find out about houses to rent. Local knowledge (in a small village or town) can often be the most useful.

Although you say that you're not too sure where you're thinking of settling, it would be helpful to know a bit more about what sort of lifestyle you're looking for?
Do you want to live in the countryside, near the sea, with or away from other Brits, how much Spanish do you speak, do you want to live in a tiny little village or a huge city - you get my drift

Which area are you visiting to do your scout about, in a couple of weeks?
If you're planning to actually move over in a couple of months, then I guess you've got some idea of the areas that interest you the most?

Although there are people on here who just packed a bag and left the UK, you'll find that the majority did do a lot of planning and organising before they left.
Have you got pet passports organised for your dogs yet?

Have you had a read through the Free Beer thread, at the top of the main Spain forum page? There's a lot of very useful information in there, which would be a good start for you perhaps?

All the best,
Sam.

and quite obviously you cant be talking about me!



Welcome to the forum, and congrats on deciding on Spain.

You will read a load of crap on here, and some really good advice, it wont take you long for you to get to know the best people to ask any advice from.

Have a search around, try the search button on top left of the page, there are some old and current threads about kids in Spain.


Enjoy.

hello,and welcome to the forum.
Some places to look for rentals include the Costa Blanca news,which has a fairly large long term rental section,not sure about the dog's though,that prob depends on landlord,most seem to be expats in CBN,would imagine you might have to go unfurnished with pets though.Rubbish at posting links,just type in, www.costablancanews and it will come up,also Kyero has long term rentals,again www.kyero will do it,however, have heard from another poster that they ask for the whole terms rent up front,plus usual 1 mths commission,so might be better to try private advertisers.
Not sure about work scenario,would imagine as a Hypnotherapist you where self employed doing Regression Therapy etc in UK,prob be best to go the same way in Spain,can tell you the procedure if your not sure how to go about it.
Good luck,& welcome to Spain.

Hi Suzannne & welcome

I note you don't do planning, but I've got to tell you if you don't plan then all could end in tears. Planning and research is the absolute key to making a successful move to Spain and you need to spend a lot of time doing both

Couldnt agree more,actually have place in Spain & family etc,still planned for a year & done trial run inthe summer re work,and still havent moved perm yet

Thank you all for replying, I know I should sit and plan but after 5 yrs talking I just feel I could spend another 5 yrs planning and still be sat here.

I've been thinking of the Valencia/Tarragona area preferably inland a bit though. The idea of staying self employed appeals. There must be a local expat newspaper around there to advertise in which I will look out for when we pop over.

All pets are passported so I am organised on that bit at least.

Ive been swinging between excitement and fear all week but been out and bought some more books today and booked tickets for trip over in two weeks.

[QUOTE=Suzanne182;5334264]Thank you all for replying, I know I should sit and plan but after 5 yrs talking I just feel I could spend another 5 yrs planning and still be sat here.

I've been thinking of the Valencia/Tarragona area preferably inland a bit though. The idea of staying self employed appeals. There must be a local expat newspaper around there to advertise in which I will look out for when we pop over.

All pets are passported so I am organised on that bit at least.

Ive been swinging between excitement and fear all week but been out and bought some more books today and booked tickets for trip over in two weeks.[/Q
Area you are looking at will be covered by CBNews or one of its sister papers,links for these are on the homepage.Advertising rates are v cheap,3.71 Euros per line,with various discounts for longer periods.If you are going to advertise in the papers be sure to register as autonomos as soon as poss,as the penalties for illegal working are harsh,with lge fines & poss deportation (for severest cases).Remember to network a lot as in Spain its who you know that counts.By the way do you spk Spanish?

Hi and welcome, don't listen to anyone, we've been here for 5 years and still haven't started planning and we're doing fine.

Couldn't disagree with you more.

While the lack of planning may seem exciting, the saddest thing about our time in Spain is watching families we knew well have to return home because they had no work, hadn't thought through how they would make ends meet, have bought a house that they now can't sell, etc.,

A really lovely family who were neighbours of ours returned to the UK this summer with a 16 year old and a 13 year old. Both teenagers will have to go back into the UK education system after two years away from it. Not an easy thing to do. Both struggled in Spanish high school and had repeated but were turning the corner, but the reason for going home was the lack of work for the parents. The sun is great but it doesn't feed you or pay bills.

We are lucky as we took early retirement and don't need to work, but Suzanne will need to find work and given the lack of Spanish it will be with fellow ex-pats, at least to begin with.

There is no need to plan everything down to the last letter, but definitely think seriously about where in Spain you want to live and what that means in terms of somewhere to live, work availability, schooling, health care and so on.

On a positive note, there are far more long term rental properties available today than ever before and I know several people who rent with pets (dogs) without any problems.

Re schools, take a look a the thread. http://britishexpats.com/forum/showthread.php?t=481740
that may give you some help.

Hi Suzzanne

You are in simular situation as me, I am a single parent with a daughter of 13yrs and we have spoken for the last couple of years about moving. I am a little scared, I will admit, because it is just us but also excited at the prospect of living in the sun and making a fresh start.

Work is not too much of an issue for me because i am self employed in the travel industry and have the oppurtunity to run my uk business from spain.

Plan of course but there will always be something that you will come up against that you will not anticipate so just go for it, scout an area that you like, find out how you can go about setting up your business, will it work in the area you are in, the business/work issue is the main part of your move because without the income it will all fall apart. Most people spend so much time thinking about finding a house that the work issue comes secondary and it should be the other way round...there a plenty of houses to rent/buy afterall.

Im going to find an area i like by renting for a little while, maybe move around a little for the first 3 months or so. Once i find somewhere that suits i will then get an office space, get connected and away i go. sounds easy but im kackin it! lol

I wish you all the best, when you see your daughter laughin and playin in the sunshine you will be happy you did it, that is what i look forward to the most.

how about costa de la luz? small but handy expat market for your business (well in chiclana anyway) - I don't know what kind of return you need to keep afloat but it might get you started. Plus gibraltar just down the coast if you need an additional english speaking market to branch out in to?

Other friends of ours are in Denia, (hour from Valencia) big expat market that way so perhaps another good option for you?

I advocate the planning bit to a degree - husband and i moved out nearly two years ago and more down to luck, some very kind bosses, and very little judgement we're now doing ok, but it was a little bit touch and go for a while and we still need to get our bottoms into gear and seriously plan for the future to make sure it continues working out.

That said, i also think sometimes, 'a little less conversation, a little more action' does go a long way but be prepared for it to be a good few years before you start to feel settled and try to ride through the hiccups...

i really wish you the best of luck and hope it works for you, keep us posted.

You don't always need to plan for ages - if you are renting a property instead of buying, it can be done quite quickly. It depends on individual circumstances.

We only thought of the idea of moving here in April, came over on a recce to look for property and moved on 1 July!

It was very quick for us, although we don't have pets or children so didn't need to research schools etc.

The main things to get first are a;money for a min of 6mths,b;language,and c;work,then rest schools etc you can probably find on this forum,I believe theres a couple of schools threads on here