Economy in the Netherlands?

Hi Jessica; welcome to the Forum.

I've always been of the opinion that a person who can work with their hands will never be out of work.  The limiting factors are how much work and will they get paid enough doing it, to live a reasonable life.

First off - can you afford to live somewhere in Holland.  The Numbeo website provides information regarding this; this link will take you there.  I've used Dublin for the comparison with Eindhoven; the site tells us that you need to earn in the region of € 3,500 net of tax and other regulatory payments and that you'll get more for your Euro in Holland, than you would in Dublin.  The costs they use are based on historical data over the past 12 months, so are always a bit behind the curve.

Secondly - getting work, to get work, you (and your partner) will really need to tick some boxes:

  Relevant Qualifications - the Dutch are big on qualifications
  Relevant experience - sounds like you have that
  Speak the local language - very important
  Luck - which can often completely overrule the other 3

You need to take a hard look at the reality of what you are contemplating doing (especially as you have 2 kids with you in this).  At the top of this page are a couple of links; one is to our Handy Tools link (I recommend you read through the articles in there, they will help you plan your journey).  Another is a link to our Jobs section, I just checked and there is at least one company (Cekaflex) advertising for carpenters; give them a call and see what they have to offer - who knows, you may get lucky straight away.  If that doesn't work, use Google - the Dutch word for a carpenter is "Timmerman"; find out who's advertising and get in contact.

Once you've read the articles I referred to, if you have any further specific questions, please come back to us.

Hope this helps.

Cynic
Expat Team

Thank you very much Cynic.
As we ate a bilingual household I'd imagine learning Dutch shouldn't be too hard as we already speak German and English at home (apart from my partner but he understands and is around german a lot)

I will habe a look at those pages. 

You're right. It's very important to get this right as we are a family.
He would go over first to work and get settled without us.

My biggest fear is the rent though as we pay only 600€ a month for a bungalow with 3 bedrooms and a sitting room etc. 
And it seems we would need to pay at least double that in the netherlands.

I can't seem to find the job offer. It just comes up there aren't any jobs at the moment.

Thank you