Buying a house in Holland

Many things are difficult and tedious in Holland, like getting utilities connected, internet connection fixed, and immigration issues.
But buying a house is one thing that is easy.

The main factor that greases the wheels is that everyone involved makes money out of the transaction so they are motivated to make it happen.

All you need to do is choose the house. This is fairly simple by searching on Funda.nl. You can specify your price range and postcode, number of rooms and various other options to limit the search. There are a few house related words to learn such as slaapkamer (bedroom), woonkamer (living room), zolder (attic), trap (stairs), badkamer (bathroom), tuin (garden).

You can also get the latest houses that are listed for sale sent to your email, via another website, iblue.nl.

When you see a house you like, simply call the makelaar (real estate agent) and the wheels will be set in motion. The makelaar always knows a mortgage (hypotheek) advisor. They are a fairly generic breed, like tax agents, but there are a few sharks. You need to choose the type of mortgage, usually half interest only and half investment loan, where part of the payment goes into a savings account. A five or ten year fixed interest term is also an option, but some say the variable rate always works out best.

You generally lose up to 1% of the cost of the house as a fee that is shared by the bank and the mortgage advisor. You can sometimes trim this down to 0.5% or so by bargaining or dealing direct with a bank. Other costs are 6% stamp duty, and the notary fee, which should be about €1500. You need to call a few notaries to get a decent price. The total extra costs should be about 8%.

One ludicrous feature of the Dutch market is that makelaars sell their services as a 'buying agent', to hunt down the property of your dreams, inspect the faults and negotiate the price. For this service they take another fat 1%. This custom must have evolved pre-internet, because now you would need to be chronically lazy or technically retarded to pay 2000+ euros for someone to search on Funda for you.

Selling agents are in my experience fairly honest and straightforward, unlike their counterparts in Australia and UK. Perhaps in keeping with the Dutch ideal of minimalist service, they don't really try to sell you the house, but just show up for appointments to show you houses and then wait for you to call. In this case there is a lot to be said for Dutch service. It seems they are not hungry, since they rarely work after 5 PM or on weekends. This can make it hard to inspect houses if you also work 9 to 5.

Bargaining the price is simply a matter of making a low starting offer. The sale price will invariably settle somewhere near the middle of the asking price and your first offer. There are usually about six or 8 offers and counter offers. A ten percent discount off the advertised price is normal. It helps to check the price of similar houses in the neighbourhood.

You need to supply your latest three payslips, or if you are not a permanent employee you need to show 3 years of tax declarations ('aangiftes') which shows all the details submitted for your tax return. The mortgage advisor should get the mortgage approved within about 5 weeks.

Interest rates vary between the numerous lending organisations, and some have fees for ending the mortgage when you sell the house, or bigger commissions for the agent, or a monthly 'service cost' on the mortgage, which effectively changes the rate significantly, so you need to ask the agent about all these. The mortgage insurance is another area where the mortgage advisor will rip you off if he can, so ask how much of that insurance he gets.

Most houses in Holland are 'one in a row', something like a terrace house in Australia or UK. They are usually 3 floors, with the attic often unrenovated and used as a storage area. Some have dormer windows (dakkapels) in the attic, which increases the size of the liveable space. I have two dakkapels in my current attic, enough room for a table tennis table, which was lowered by crane when they built the windows. Impossible to remove without destroying the table.

Laminate is the most popular floor covering these days, and 'off the floor' toilets are considered so highly that house photos often include a picture proudly displaying an off the floor toilet. Most houses are painted white inside, because of the generally held belief that white makes the house look bigger. This is important when you are working with houses of around 120 square meters, about half the average size of an Australian house.

Sometimes houses in Holland are sold or rented completely bare, except for the fittings that can't be prised off the wall. Even the floor coverings are sometimes removed. Unless you have strong opinions about what objects should fill a house, I find it better to aim for houses with floor coverings, light fittings and curtains. Even some furniture can be negotiated into the deal, which can be handy if you are not keen on shopping at Ikea. Ikea is the most popular Dutch furniture shop. Most young people seem to think that any trashy Ikea furniture is better than solid oak or teak furniture that lasts many lifetimes. They disparagingly refer to the latter as 'Omas' (grandmother's) furniture.

Often the bathroom and kitchen will be very basic, in which case you need to allow €15,000 or so to redo the bathroom and kitchen. Laminate is a good cheap option to replace old carpet, and should cost under €200 per bedroom to get laid (so to speak).

Double windows are an asset since they save on heating bills, and a newish boiler should entail less maintenance costs. Watch out for 'service costs' on flats in a block. The service cost can be over €200 per month, non-tax deductible, which effectively increases the mortgage cost significantly.

The notary does all the legal work and gets the relevant papers sent to the relevant authorities. The makelaar should inform you of the utility companies that were used by the previous owner, so you can call them to continue the service. The makelaar should read the meters and send these to the utility companies.

It is an easy process, so I would recommend anyone to buy a house while the prices are low. There has been little increase if any for a few years now.

Are you are looking for a Maastricht house for rent.