Mortgage advice for expats
How to buy a house in The Netherlands step-by-step?

In this step-by-step plan you will gain insight into how you can buy your dream home step by step. Below are the 6 steps to buy a house in the Netherlands and to get an idea of the entire buying process.
The first step is to determine your budget and research your Dutch mortgage options. What is the maximum mortgage you can borrow? How much are you willing to spend on a home? It is important that your home remains affordable so that you can still enjoy life.
For a rough indication, you can use our mortgage calculator. For an exact mortgage calculation, you can make a free appointment with one of our mortgage advisors at Home Financials.
After this appointment you will have a clear overview of your maximum Dutch mortgage and your monthly costs. This way you will know in which price range you should look for a house and avoid buying a house you cannot afford.
To search for a suitable home you can use the largest funda platform. You can browse on websites like Funda to find out which houses are for sale. I also recommend using the social media mediums and following the broker pages. And final to register for the new housing offer of the relevant broker. Since you already determined your budget for buying a house, you know which houses you can and cannot afford.
Have you found the perfect house? Then it’s time to call the real estate agent for planning a home viewing! If you work with a buying agent, you are more likely to have your eventual offer accepted. Of course, this is not a requirement and you can also arrange it yourself.
Make before you visit this house a list with questions which you want to ask. This means that when you’re buying a property in the Netherlands, you’ll have to gather information about the house you want to buy.
Don't forget to add the financial clause "subject to financing." In the Netherlands there are no pre-approvals or principle mortgages, so you need to be sure you can get a mortgage for what you are bidding.
Congratulations!
Your offer has been accepted. Now it’s time to sign a presale agreement (koopakte). It must be drawn up by a lawyer and signed by both buyer and seller. As a buyer, you can protect yourself by signing a purchase agreement with a financial clause. This protects you if a mortgage lender decides to decline a mortgage application, enabling you to pull out of the sale without penalty.
Since you don't buy a home every day, the buyer also has a 3-day cooling-off period to cancel the deal without reason. When the cooling-off period is over, the purchase agreement is binding to both parties. Typically after arranging your mortgage, a deposit of 10% of the purchase price is required – if you don’t have this saved, your mortgage adviser can arrange a bank guarantee.
Now is the time to arrange your mortgage (hypotheek). You could do this directly with a bank or you could use a independent mortgage adviser from Home Financials. The advantage from an independent company is that they can compare many different mortgage products available to you. Mortgage brokers in the Netherlands typically work with more than 30 lenders, while banks represent only themselves. You usually have six weeks to finalise a mortgage.
There are also different types of mortgages – annuity, linear and interest-only – and an adviser can help you figure out which works best for your circumstances. In the Netherlands, you can borrow up to 100% of the purchase price – but make sure you are aware of the additional closing fees that you will need to pay as part of the purchase, and which are not included in your mortgage.
These are usually marked as kosten koper and include the transfer fee (overdrachtsbelasting), notary fees and valuation fees. The transfer fee is either 2% or 8% of the purchase price, depending on your situation.
Read more on this subject on our page https://homefinancials.nl/cost-of-buying-a-house-financing
Appraiser
When buying a house in the Netherlands you will need to have the property appraised. This is a part of your mortgage file which in most cases is required by the lender. In the Netherlands the maximum mortgage you can get is based on the appraised value of the property. Lenders finance 100% of the market value of the home. We can mediate an independent appraiser in our services.
Home Financials help you with these home insurance policies.
Nearly there! When your mortgage is approved, the final step is to sign a mortgage deed and a transfer contract (akte van levering) at the notary (notaris). Before that, your notary sends you a statement with the closing fees, which must be paid by the transfer date. The good news is that fees related to the mortgage are tax-deductible in the Netherlands.
If your Dutch skills aren’t so strong, the notary will require the presence of an interpreter to ensure you completely understand the terms of the contracts. And once every page has been signed and dated, the notary will inform the Dutch Land Registry (Kadaster) about the transfer, and you can walk away with the keys to your new home.
Congratulations, you now are a real homeowner!
What is your maximum mortgage in The Netherlands?
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Reviews

As an expat from France, buying a home in The Netherlands seemed at first sight like an overcomplicated project that only natives could perform, especially in this booming market with high demand. But I was wrong. Thanks to the advisers help, this challenging project has been achieved and owning an apartment in Rotterdam is now a reality for me. She has always been very reactive to answer my questions and wonders. She has been very professional by always making sure that the process and conditions were well understood by myself. I've really appreciated her positive mindset which made interactions and communication very pleasant. I definitely recommend Home Financials to all persons willing to purchase their first home here in the Netherlands
Corentin

Very positive experience! Home Financials have a great and professional financial advisor, who helped us every step of the way with buying a house in Rotterdam as an expat. She took special care and time to explain all details in English and led us through the process of getting a mortgage in the Netherlands. She works extremely efficiently, responds immediately to calls and emails and is always ready to answer all the additional questions. She gave us good guidance but also freedom to decide about details of the mortgage. We are very happy with this experience and can recommend her services with confidence.
Damien en Isabella

Home Financials is very responsible and knowledgeable. The advisor is flexible with making appointments, very helpful and patience to explain me the whole mortgage process. I have a very smooth and satisfied experience from Home financials. Highly recommended!!
Mandy

Thanks to Home Financials!Excellent service from state to finish. The service we received was excellent. Any question we had was answered and explained to us properly in a professional way. She was so flexible and accessible at anytime. She was also well organized and never missed any details even the most smallest ones. Almost the only thing we did was signing the contracts 🙂 Our application was approved very quickly and it was the easiest part of the whole process. As an expat, it was also quite efficient to work. Iwould strongly recommend her services for anyone who is looking for an excellent mortgage advise.
Godze & Inan

We moved to the Netherlands just 5 months ago as a expat. She has done a great job on understanding our demands and finding solution. It was so hard to get a mortgage in our situation because we were in the Netherlands for 5 months. But with her experience and research of all the lenders our mortgage approved very fast!It was a great pleasure to work with Home Financials. We Certainly Advice Home Financials
Cagdas & Merve

We are very happy with the advisors work from Home Finacials. She worked hard to help us get the mortgage accepted like an expat. She was one step ahead and took all the necessary actions to make it happen , even though it was a difficult sitiation. Very proffesional, she helped us with the translation of the documents, to make sure that we understand all the important information. She was always reachable through phone/email. Thank you Sema! 🙂
Maria & Dionysios
Erkend financieel adviseur
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